


Clinging

by braveten



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: AU, F/M, Reunion, Time Lord Rose
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-18
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-02-21 15:39:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 32,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2473526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/braveten/pseuds/braveten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just when Martha Jones thought the Doctor was out of her life for good - she was proven wrong. The last thing Martha had anticipated was to have a two-hearted woman named Rose Tyler show up and collapse in her arms. But upon finding the Doctor's previously lost companion, the Torchwood team and Martha know there's only one man to call... And that's where things get complicated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys!!! I've already posted four chapters of this story on Tumblr, Whofic, and Fanfiction.net so I figured I'd post it here, too. :)

Just when Martha Jones thought the Doctor was out of her life for good – she was proven wrong.

Her feet felt soggy in the damp leather shoes that they were currently clad in. Even the white socks underneath were totally soaked, and mud was scattered across her ankles, calves, and even her knees. God, she wanted a shower more than anything else in the world. It wasn’t that she wasn’t used to running, but running in an emergency while being drenched with rain wasn’t number one on her list of favorite activities.

“Rose. Rose Tyler.”

That was what the peculiar girl had said a moment before she had passed out in Martha’s arms. It didn’t take a genius (though Martha was one, anyways) to connect the pieces in this intricate puzzle.

Martha looked down at Rose laying on the medical bed, her features tranquil and her arms folded across her stomach, which rose up and down with each gentle breath she took. This was the Doctor’s Rose. There was no doubt about it. This was the woman he had loved and lost. The woman who had broken his hearts.

And, god, why did it hurt to be around her? Martha’s head had been pounding rapidly for the last ten minutes. She was used to crises – there was no way it was just the shock getting to her. Martha rubbed at her temples.

“You okay?” Jack Harkness asked from behind her, resting his hand on her shoulder.

God, she loved Jack.

He was reliable, always there and never questioned the strange or weird. Though, of course, that was why he had picked working at Torchwood instead of an office job working nine to five on weekdays. That, and the inevitable fact that he was completely immortal.

“Fine,” Martha replied through a lump in her throat. 

Martha knew that Jack had known the girl currently reclining in front of them. And… He had said that she was human a while ago. So why, when Martha had found her, did she have two hearts beating in her chest? Things connected to the Doctor kept popping up again and again. Rose Tyler, two hearts, and unconscious. Three things that Martha related to the traveling Time Lord she knew and loved in her head.

“We’re going to have to call him, you know,” Jack said, rubbing at his forehead. “He won’t be happy.”

“Why not? Wouldn’t he be glad to see Rose again?” Martha asked, genuinely confused. She had never actually seen the Doctor and Rose together – all she knew was that he had loved her. And, knowing the Doctor’s eccentric charm, she had probably loved him.

“My head hurts,” Jack complained, evidently avoiding her question. “Does your head hurt?”

Martha nodded. She opened her mouth to say something, but before she could, Owen Harper, the Torchwood team medic, spoke up from nearby. Martha had forgotten he was even there.

“She’s stable. I can’t understand what’s wrong with her though.” One hand flew to his face and he scratched at his sideburn absent-mindedly. “The two hearts especially isn’t making it easy. But from what I can tell… She’s healthy. No telling why she passed out.” He made a noise of frustration and bounced over to another screen. “Do you guys have headaches? Why does my head hurt so bad? Fuck…”

Jack rolled his eyes. “Language, Owen.”

Owen gave a half-hearted shrug but kept his mouth shut. Martha turned to Jack. “Should we call him now?”

Jack shrugged. “It’s just a matter of time. Though I thought… I thought she was trapped in a parallel universe. If Rose is here then something is very wrong.”

Martha already knew that. In fact, everyone knew that. It was obvious. “I can’t stand this headache. I’m calling the Doctor,” she decided in her best UNIT voice.

Jack licked his lips and looked at Rose, then back at Martha. “And if he comes and she doesn’t wake up? Do you really think he deserves to be put through that again?”

“She’ll probably wake up,” Owen mused. “But then again, she might not. Since I can’t tell what made her pass out, it’s a bit hard to tell whether it’s permanent or not. It has all the signs of a coma, though. And then some. But if you’re going to call him or not, I’d advice you to make up your mind now. Before my head implodes.”

Martha produced a sleek, black mobile phone from her pocket. “Jack, are you suggesting we don’t tell him? We just nurse her back to health and, if she wakes up, we call him and go ‘Oh, hey, your girlfriend from a parallel universe was at Torchwood this whole time! We just figured we’d call you when she woke up, you know. No big deal.’”

“Good plan,” Owen muttered from behind her.

Jack groaned in annoyance. “Okay, then. Let’s call him up and get him all excited only to have him see Rose die within five minutes of getting here?” Spit flew from his mouth as his voice rose mid-sentence.

Owen and Martha stared unblinkingly at him, and Jack looked down at his own hands to see them trembling. He wiped sweat off on his jeans and shoved his hands roughly in his coat pockets. “I love Rose,” he said once his voice was steady. “She made me what I am, this atrocity, but I still love her. And I love him, too. And I know they love each other. I’m not putting him through unnecessary pain. So we’re going to give it a day, you hear me? One day and if she’s still like this, we’ll call him.”

After a moment, Martha swallowed. “Yeah, okay. Twenty-four hours.”

~

The Doctor found Donna in the library, her legs propped up on the cherry wood coffee table and her head reclined on the sepia colored cushions. She had a book in both of her hands and was staring at the words with interest, her eyes scanning one line, then the next.

When she heard his footsteps her head swung upwards, red hair flopping. “Donna!” he called happily, hands stuffed in his brown pinstripe pockets. “Donna Noble,” he accentuated the accents of her name and threw himself down on the couch next to her, eyes twinkling with delight. “What would you say to the planet of Barcelona? The planet, not the city!”

Donna rolled her eyes playfully and doggy eared the corner of one book. The Doctor gasped and grabbed the book from her swiftly, undoing the fold. “That’s no good for books, hasn’t anyone told you!” he scolded. “Just use a bookmark. There are over a thousand bookmarks in this library, Donna.”

“Get me a bookmark then,” Donna replied, shrugging.

He did. As he jumped up from the couch to retrieve one, he continued talking. “On Barcelona, they have dogs with no noses! Isn’t that just brilliant? That joke never gets old. Never!”

“Sounds great, Doctor,” Donna said with a grin that only made his increase. “Barcelona.”

“Mind you, I’ve never actually been there myself. Can you imagine? Me? Never having been somewhere? I’ve always been too busy, I suppose. I’ve met people from there, but never set foot on Barcelonian soil. You know, everyone there has purple ears. Well,” he tugged at his ear, “not completely purple. More like, it starts pink and then gradients to purple.” He saw the humored look on Donna’s face and frowned, “And I’m rambling again, aren’t I.”

“Course you are, you weird Martian,” Donna retorted happily, grabbing his forearm and leading him out the door. “Come on, you’re going to show me Barcelona. And if they don’t have a beach there, I’m gonna kill you.”

He groaned. “What is up with humans and beaches? I will never understand it.”

Donna stopped walking. “Is that a phone? I think I hear a phone.”

The Doctor paused as well, ruffling his hair. “Yep,” he popped the ‘p’. “Definitely a phone. Must be the one on the console!”

Without warning, he grabbed Donna’s hand and they sprinted to the console room, laughing. When they reached the console he picked up the phone. “Hello?”

“It’s Martha,” the other line said.

“Martha Jones,” the Doctor replied happily. His eyebrows shot to his hairline as he looked at Donna. “What can I do for you?”

He heard someone talking in the background. Was that… Jack? “I’m at Torchwood, we need your help with something. It’s uh, extremely urgent. Extremely.” She repeated the word with even more emphasis, and he nodded.

“I’ll be right over.”

“What was that about?” Donna asked him.

The Doctor began his usual dance around the console, flipping levers and switching buttons. “Don’t know. Emergency at Torchwood. You ever meet Captain Jack, Donna?”

Donna grinned brightly. “Nope. But I’ve heard the stories. And they usually end with him naked.”

“Accurate.”

By the time the police box materialized in the Torchwood hub, the entire team and Martha were waiting to meet them. Donna stepped out first and hugged Martha before gawking at Jack, who extended his hand. “Captain Jack Harkness.”

“Donna Noble,” she replied, raising her eyebrows at Martha who simply gave her a knowing look. “Might I say you live up to your reputation, Captain.” She gave a wink on the last word.

Then the Doctor exited the police box. His hands were deep in his pockets and he groaned, “Don’t start.”

When the doors to the TARDIS were shut, everyone noticed the Doctor stiffen uncomfortably. He froze up, muscles tense. “Martha, what was your emergency? What’s in here?”

“I called you because – wait, what do you mean what’s in here?” The Doctor didn’t hear her last few words, for he was already marching down the hallway. “Doctor! Wait, I need to explain something to you first.”

“What’s going on?” Donna asked, hurrying along behind him.

Jack stepped in front of the Doctor’s path and rested his hands on his shoulders. “Doc, listen. Martha found her on the sidewalk somewhere. She passed out, but she’s stable. We made sure she’s perfectly-“

“Get out of the way, Jack,” the Doctor said in a tone that came out much icier than he had obviously intended. However, it worked, because Jack did as he was told.

Rose looked as stunning as she always had, to say the least. She hadn’t changed at all since Martha had discovered her, but since it was a little chilly in the Torchwood hub they had draped a currant colored blanket over her. Her hair was spread neatly underneath her on a fluffy white pillow and her face was relaxed.

Upon seeing her body, the Doctor froze on the top of the stairs. Then, after a moment that felt like ten eternities squashed together, he stepped down two steps at once and reached her in two long strides. He reached Rose and moved one hand to her cheek, as if not believing she was quite real.

Martha, Donna, and Jack couldn’t see his face, but what he was feeling was evident from his body language. His entire body was trembling, which was a rather rare sight, and he was touching her so gingerly Donna wouldn’t have been surprised to find that his hand wasn’t actually making contact with her skin at all. After touching her cheek he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down.

Then, the Doctor reached down a hand towards Rose’s limp fingers. He intertwined their fingers experimentally and looked down at their joined hands. It was then that Donna could finally see his face. She didn’t even recognize the man who stood in front of her. Of course it was the Doctor - it had to be. But the innocence of his expression was something she had never seen before on him. It was as if, all this time travelling without Rose, he had had barriers up that blocked anyone seeing what he was truly thinking or feeling. And now they were all gone.

It was as if he wanted to capture this moment and never ever let it go, he was just content to sit there with her hand in his and stroking her cheek in small, circular motions with his thumb. The Doctor sniffled and Donna blinked. He couldn’t be crying, could he? Was that possible, the Doctor crying like that? If it was, she had certainly never seen it, and she was willing to be that Martha and Jack hadn’t, either.

“She’s real,” Jack assured, breaking the moment and stepping forward. “But, Doctor, listen to her hearts.”

The Doctor didn’t tear his eyes away from Rose. He simply used the hand that had previously been on her cheek to feel her heartbeat. Or… Beats. The shock was obvious on his face the moment he heard it. Four consecutive beats. The heartbeat of a Time Lord… Or… A Time Lady.

“Rose,” the Doctor let out a choked gasp and finally brought his body close to hers in an awkward one-sided hug. “Rose, what did you do?”

Nobody moved while the Doctor held her body, but eventually he pulled back. “We need to get her into the TARDIS. I need to run tests. How long has she been like this? How long has she been at Torchwood? Tell me everything.”

“She’s been at Torchwood a day,” Jack stated. The Doctor cringed.

The Time Lord picked up Rose’s body, one arm supporting her legs and the other supporting her neck. He kissed her forehead briefly before glaring at Jack. “Why didn’t you tell me earlier? You should have called me the moment you found her, Jack.”

Jack’s face paled. “We just thought…”

“No, you didn’t think,” the Doctor thundered, stepping quickly towards the TARDIS. “She could be dying. Do you care about her at all?”

“Of course I do,” Jack blurted, following the Doctor down the hallway. “We made sure she was stable. We just thought we’d give it a day.”

“A day? For what to happen?” the Doctor hissed through his teeth. “I don’t have time for this. Where’s the doctor around here?”

Owen ran up to him. “My name is Owen Harper. I’m the medical guy around here. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

The Doctor just sighed. “Open the door for me.”

“You didn’t say he was a charmer, Jack,” Owen said as he held the door open for the Doctor and Rose.


	2. Chapter 2

Donna cleared her throat from the doorway. The Doctor glanced up fleetingly; his glasses perched precariously on the tip of his nose and his face unnecessarily close to the screen in front of him. “Come in,” he said, turning back to the screen quickly and clicking on several things with the mouse in his right hand.

A highly technologically advanced cardiac monitor was perched on a short white cabinet against the far wall, and the beat of Rose’s two mysterious hearts echoed around the walls of the room. The Doctor seemed to pay no attention to Donna, who sat down by Rose’s bed and stared at the girl’s peaceful face. It was hard to imagine this girl the way Jack and the Doctor had described her – so brilliant and cheerful. Right now she just seemed… Well… Lifeless.

The Doctor ran a hand through his hair and shot Rose a quick glance, as if making sure she hadn’t gone and vanished in the few minutes he hadn’t been staring at her. Then, he made a frustrated sound in the back of his throat. “She’s stabilized, I figured out that much, but the hearts… Why the hearts? What happened to her?”

“When she wakes up she can tell you,” Donna suggested optimistically, grabbing Rose’s hand in her own and smiling at the Doctor.

It didn’t seem to refuel his hope at all.

“It seems like… Like…” He tugged on his ear so hard Donna thought it might just fall off. Then, he collapsed in the chair in front of the computer, staring at her and shaking his head. “It’s like a regeneration coma. But that’s insane! Well, it’s the only plausible explanation… But it’s totally ridiculous!”

Donna blinked. “A regeneration coma? Like that thing where you change your whole face or whatever?”

He nodded.

“So she’s like you then, isn’t she? What, did you insert your Martian genes into her?” Donna asked playfully.

The Doctor didn’t even grant Donna a smile at that. If anything, it only made him look more worried. Normally, the classic Martian joke always amused him, even if he obstinately would never admit it. “I don’t know what’s wrong with her. If she would just wake up…” He shook his head once again, staring at Rose, deep in thought.

“Doctor,” Donna said gently, standing up and walking over to him. It was obvious that he didn’t want her comfort or her pity. He turned his face away from her, pretending to be interested in the monitor in front of him. She simply rested her hand on his shoulder. “I know things are confusing. But Rose is back. Isn’t that good?”

To her surprise, he looked her straight in the eyes and swallowed. “Yeah. It is good.”

~

Jack entered the Torchwood medical bay, where Rose had been moved, two hours later, lingering in the doorway. He didn’t need to say anything - he knew the Doctor realized he was standing there. Eventually, the Time Lord in question waved his hand in a beckoning gesture and Jack entered cautiously, sitting down next to Rose and grabbing her hand instinctively. “How is she?” Jack asked.

“Stable,” the Doctor replied factually. “I still don’t know why she… Why she is the way she is,” he decided on saying after a moment. It was probably better than using messed up.

“Doctor, about earlier, I…”

“I overreacted. I know you care about her. I’m sorry,” the Doctor said, not meeting the other man’s eyes.

Jack simply nodded. “I’m sorry, too. We should have called you the moment Martha found her. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

There was a companionable silence between them for the next few minutes. The steady beeping of Rose’s two hearts reverberated about the room. Then, Jack’s head started hurting once again.

“Doctor, the headache, it’s back,” Jack complained, rubbing at his temples. It seemed slightly worse than last time. Or was it just his imagination?

The Doctor frowned, glancing at a screen before flicking his eyes back to Jack. “It occurs with too much exposure to her. I think… I think it’s her telepathy, some how.”

“Her telepathy?” Jack inquired, standing up to grab some Advil from a nearby bottle. “So she is a full Time Lord, now?”

“When Time Lords are first emerged from the loom, which was the machine with which the, well, artificial – that’s the best word I can use, members of my species were made,” the Doctor explained, “their telepathic capabilities aren’t under control. Sometimes, they reach out and try to find other Time Lords. In certain Lords and Ladies, it didn’t occur, but in most it was a common occurrence. Back then, everyone was used to the lashing out of children. The pain was barely noticeable – we were all jaded. But now…”

“Your head hurts too?” Jack understood, getting the answer to his question from the pained look on the Doctor’s face. Jack swallowed the four pills in his hand and downed them with a glass of tap water.

He nodded. “A little. But I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

“Doctor,” Jack’s voice was warning. “You’ve been in here with her for over two hours. How bad does it hurt? Be honest with me.”

The Doctor simply swallowed and looked at Rose, then at Jack. “I’m fine,” was his simple, expected answer. “I’ll be fine. I’m going to stay here with her tonight. Keep her monitored. If she wakes up, she’ll need a familiar face nearby. If her telepathic abilities are this strong right now, who knows what she might do if she panics when she wakes up? Rose wouldn’t want me to let her hurt anyone.”

“Let’s take shifts,” Jack recommended.

The Doctor tensed noticeably. “I’ll stay with her. It’s fine. I’m fine,” he insisted.

Jack sighed. “You need sleep, Doc.”

“You know I don’t sleep nightly, Jack,” came the Doctor’s far too rude retort.

Jack folded his arms across his chest and let out a breath. “Donna told me it’s been five days since you slept.”

The Doctor cursed under his breath and spun around on his heels, facing the computer screen again. “Fine, we’ll take shifts. But I’m sleeping in here with her.”

“But your head…“

“It’s fine, Jack!” the Doctor shouted suddenly, his face red.

They stared at each other for a moment before Martha appeared in the doorway. “Everything all right in here? I heard you shout,” she said innocently, eyes wide with worry. “Is Rose okay?”

The Time Lord let out a breath. “She’s fine. We’re all fine. I’m spending the night here with her. You, Jack, and Donna can take shifts watching her. Owen, Gwen, Ianto, and Tosh can too, if they fancy.”

Jack nodded and ushered himself and Martha out of the room, leaving the Doctor alone with an unconscious Rose Tyler in front of him.

The Doctor sat in the chair by her bed, joining his hands with hers. Then, he had an idea. He extended up one hand to her left temple, touching it gingerly and closing his own eyes. He let out a heavy breath, wary not to enter her mind at all, and content to just have her active yet unconscious mind next to his conscious one.

He reached out, attempting to send waves of comfort over to her. It seemed to work for a moment, since the pain in his head dulled considerably. Her mind was sending wave after wave of pure confusion, and he could tell she was attempting to make a connection with someone, anyone. On Gallifrey, new Time Lords or Ladies connected parentally with their parents. It was instinct.

In the end, it made perfect sense that Rose’s mind was reaching out. However, it was impossible for her to get a parental connection. Unless Time Lady Jackie Tyler or Time Lord Pete Tyler was waiting outside. God. Jackie as a Time Lady. That was a nightmare that he did not need to dwell on.

But Rose couldn’t be a true Time Lady anyways. It was impossible. Surely this was some sort of… Opposite Chameleon Arch? Some sort of temporary change or delusion. It wasn’t possible, but it was the only thing that made sense. Or… There was another possibility… One that he desperately didn’t want to look at.

The Master could have done this.

A little voice kept whispering that thought in the back of his mind, and he was constantly telling it to shut up. The Master was dead. Lucy Saxon had shot him.

But what other possibility is there? That obnoxious, persistent voice asked him that again and again. He loathed not being able to figure things out. And this headache seemed to only get worse the longer he sat here with Rose.

He brushed some stray hair off of her forehead and their slight mental connection broke with the loss of the light contact to her temple. However, his headache lessened as he stroked her cheek absent mindedly, and he could have sworn he saw her mouth twitch just slightly. But her heartbeats didn’t change their pace, and her beautiful brown eyes didn’t open.

The Doctor let out a sigh and stood up to shut the door to the medical bay. The last thing he wanted was someone walking down the hall and seeing him like this. He walked over to a screen and stared at it a moment before realizing there truly weren’t any more tests he could run. He had done blood samples – they had come out fully Time Lord. He had done one or two X-rays (completely harmless due to the technology he had available, of course) just to test some theories and he had performed countless scans with equipment from a distant planet.

Nothing.

Zero. Zip. Zilch. Nada.

After a moment of flipping through screens, knowing deep down that nothing had changed but hoping nevertheless, he contented himself with sitting in the chair by her bed and searching her face. He rested one hand high on her chest, listening to the heartbeats that synced with the beeping from the monitors.

The Doctor let out a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding and raised one hand to his head. He could easily put up mental blocks around his own consciousness and stop the pain that vibrated through him time after time. But what if Rose needed him? Needed to connect to him? He shivered at the thought of having to perform a marital bond with her without her permission. No, he wouldn’t do that.

But if it would save her life in the future? If she was never going to wake up, and only a mental connection could? What would Rose want him to do?

Though parental and other family bonds could be broken, a Gallifreyan marital bond couldn’t be severed. It was pure, simple fact. It had never been broken before without death being involved in the matter. There was no divorce or get out of jail free card in marital bonding. If he did that to her, if he had to do that to her… She would never be with anyone else. At least… Like that.

Not that they were like that. And not that they would be. Of course they wouldn’t be.

Jack, Martha, and the other members of the Torchwood team were remarkable for being able to withstand the headache for this long. But the pain was worse for him since his telepathic abilities were far more advanced than theirs. He wasn’t sure how long it would take until it became so bad he wouldn’t be able to think or be in the same room as her. It was a scary thought.

But at least this small connection, no matter how unbearable the pain, was a constant reminder that Rose Tyler was next to him. Living, breathing, and most importantly real. And despite the fact that he would never tell Jack, Martha, or Donna… He needed that reminder. He was terrified, in complete honesty. Absolutely terrified.

He wasn’t sure he could afford to lose this precious pink-and-yellow human ever again.

After about an hour had passed, he realized Jack was right. He truly was exhausted, and Donna hadn’t been lying when she had allegedly told Jack that it had been five days since he had gotten sleep. He texted Martha with the phone he so rarely used but carried around anyways and asked her to come down and watch over Rose for a few hours while he slept.

Then, he leaned back in the chair next to Rose’s bed and kept one of Rose’s hands clasped in his. His eyes began drifting shut and he allowed them, falling into a deep sleep all at once.

~

Martha entered the medical bay soon after receiving the Doctor’s text. He had assured her, twice, that he would only need a few hours of sleep and would wake up automatically when he had rested. But what she saw when she entered the med bay hadn’t been what she had expected at all.

The Doctor sleeping was a rare sight, and in fact Martha had probably never seen him completely asleep before. Catnaps around the TARDIS were occasional, and she had definitely seen him extremely tired before (more times than she would have liked). But this, this was a deep, human-like sleep.

His head was lolled forward and he sat in an uncomfortable-looking position in the wooden chair. One of his hands was dangling over the side of the chair and the other was clasped in Rose’s. His legs were both facing forward, spread apart slightly. His face was peaceful and his hair was falling over his eyes, and it was perhaps one of the sweetest sights Martha had ever seen before in her life.

She approached both of them, wondering just how easily the Doctor would wake up. When she lightly touched his shoulder, he didn’t move at all. Martha carefully scooted his body from the chair onto the bed, which wasn’t too hard of a transition due to the height of the chair matching of that of the bed. She laid him on his side gently; careful to place his head on the fluffiest part of the pillow for maximum comfort, and smiled despite herself when he automatically curled up into Rose in his sleep.

His nose buried in the young girl’s hair and her hand stayed clutched in his like it was his lifeline and he was drowning at sea. Martha draped a blanket over both of them and felt her heart fill with warmth. Despite the fact that she had had quite the crush on the Doctor in the past, she was implausibly happy for both of them. They deserved each other. And they both most definitely deserved happiness.

Content with her work, Martha took her book out of her large coat pocket and sat in a rocking chair in the corner of the room, flipping to the page with her bookmark in it and swiftly immersing herself in the story.


	3. Chapter 3

It had been three hours, and the Doctor was most definitely not awake. Martha decided that instead of wondering why he hadn’t woken up, she would just thank whatever the reason was and go fetch Jack to take the next shift. The Doctor most definitely needed the sleep, and however he was getting it was fine by her.

Besides, he looked comfortable snuggled up in Rose Tyler. While he slept, his other hand, which had previously been entwined with her fingers, wrapped around her waist firmly. One of his legs had wedged its way between two of hers. Martha definitely hadn’t imagined him to be a cuddly sleeper, but this was pure evidence. She almost wished she could take a picture of it and use it as blackmail over him, since he looked so much like a baby kitten.

Martha left the medical bay and called on Jack. Her head was pounding – she didn’t realize just how bad it was until she had left the room with Rose and the Doctor in it. Martha rubbed at her temples and nodded with a small smile at Jack when she passed him in the hallway.

Jack frowned and grabbed her wrists where they were next to her head. “Your head hurts?”

Martha nodded. “Why are you surprised?”

Jack just let out an annoyed breath and let her go, marching down the hallway towards the medical bay. Martha was far too tired to let her mind dwell on Jack, so she went to one of the Torchwood couches and curled up with a blanket draped over herself, falling asleep almost instantly.

~

The Doctor woke up to possibly the loveliest smell in the universe – and all alternate universes, as well. The smell of Rose Tyler.

He breathed it in instinctively and his eyes opened. It took his mind a brief moment to process where he was. He felt one of his legs in between two of Rose’s jean-clad ones. His arms were around her, uncomfortably so, and both were aching. His nose had been buried in her hair and he pulled away immediately, confused.

It wasn’t as if he was sentient while sleeping, but normally he could prevent himself from doing stupid things in his sleep. Such as that. And, blimey, what time was it? No… It was morning? How was that even possible? He had asked the TARDIS to wake him up through their mental connection after a few hours! Stupid ship.

“Hey sleepyhead,” a voice said from nearby.

The Doctor looked up and saw Jack Harkness sitting in a chair by a counter, a book in his lap. “Why did nobody wake me up?” the Doctor said accusingly.

Jack shrugged. “You needed the sleep. Badly, might I say.”

“Has she… Has anything…” The Doctor searched for the right phrasing, groggier than usual from sleep.

When he sat up, he realized why he was so disoriented. Immediately he stumbled over to the nearest trashcan and heaved out all the contents of his stomach before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He stayed kneeled over the trashcan, shaking slightly.

“Doctor?” Jack said worriedly, walking over to him quickly.

The Doctor clutched at his head in a lame attempt to sever some of the pain from his massive, unbelievable headache. “I’m fine,” he said after a moment, standing up on wobbly legs. He sat back down on the side of the bed since he didn’t trust his legs to support him. “Just my head. Hurts a bit.”

Jack didn’t look even slightly convinced. “Come outside Torchwood with me for an hour or two. You need some fresh air and to get away from her for a bit.”

Bad phrasing, Jack noted a moment later.

The Doctor clutched Rose’s hand. “What if she wakes up? Or something changes?”

“We’ll have Martha or Donna or Gwen watching her at all times. I promise you personally that she will be okay.” Jack walked towards the door. “Doc, you’re not healthy. You literally just threw up your dinner.”

“I didn’t have dinner.”

“Even worse. Now come outside with me. Doctor’s orders.” Jack gave him a wink, causing the Doctor to roll his eyes.

With one last fleeting glance at Rose, the Doctor stood up and clutched at the wall, swallowing. “Fine. But only for ten minutes.”

“Thirty,” Jack countered.

“Twenty.”

“Deal.”

The Doctor stepped outside the medical bay, hoping Jack wouldn’t note how he was still touching the wall gingerly for support. If he noticed, he didn’t say anything about it. Jack pulled out his phone, “I’ll text Gwen. She should be down in a minute.”

“We’ll wait until she comes,” the Doctor claimed obstinately, waiting outside the bay door.

Truthfully, he wanted to get away from that room. He didn’t want to get away from Rose, of course, but the banging in his head was obnoxious and hurt like hell. So when Gwen came down the hall, promising to look after his Rose, he was somewhat relieved.

Jack led him outside Torchwood and clapped him on the back somewhat awkwardly. “So Doc, tell me what you’ve been up to lately? Donna has told me some funny stories, but I’m convinced she’s leaving some of the more embarrassing ones out.”

The Doctor gave him a halfhearted smile. “What do you think of Donna?”

“Love her,” Jack said thoughtfully. “Very sassy, though. I’d love to witness one of your arguments with her. I’d film that, put it on YouTube, you both would be an overnight sensation!”

The Doctor laughed, genuinely that time, and Jack seemed rather proud of himself. “She definitely has strong opinions. And I see you and Martha have been close?”

Jack grinned. “Yeah, she helps us out from time to time. Gotta say, Doc, you know how to pick ‘em.”

He simply turned a little pink at that and followed Jack as he rounded a corner. “Where are we going?”

“Cardiff has great food, though you know that,” Jack said. “We’re going to a chippy shop.”

The Doctor recognized the shop that Jack took him to almost immediately. He stopped, stunned. “We went here with Rose once.”

Jack nodded encouragingly. “And we will again. But right now, it’s just you and me. Your headache feeling any better?”

It really was feeling better. “Yep. And food sounds good right now, let’s go.”

Jack and the Doctor laughed over each other’s stories throughout their sort-of meal. The shop was almost empty and the few people in the restaurant shot them weird looks when they mentioned other planets or species.

“So then, I burst in, stark naked…” Jack recalls, breaking out into laughter before he can even finish his sentence. “And guess what the Yargerine says?”

“What?” the Doctor asked, stabbing a chip with his fork and plopping it into his mouth, invested in Jack’s story and smiling despite himself.

“The Yargerine says, ‘Well, you’re bigger than my husband!’”

The Doctor burst out into laughter – he couldn’t help himself, it was a good joke, even if he questioned the validity of the entire story. Sure, the naked part was probably true, but everything else…

When he could speak again, he pushed forward his empty Styrofoam box. “We should probably get back to the hub now.”

Jack rubbed the back of his neck. “Listen, Doc, before we do… I need you to promise me something.”

The Doctor’s eyebrows shot to his hairline. He paid for the food and walked out of the shop with Jack. “What do you want to talk to me about?”

“I’m worried about you,” Jack said in a tone that sounded far too much like something out of a bad human soap opera.

The Doctor laughed quietly at that thought, earning him an angry look from Jack, who was obviously very serious about this matter. “Why would you be worried about me?”

“If your head hurts too bad around Rose, you have to tell us. Or if anything happens to you. Rose needs you at your best right now, Doc. She doesn’t deserve you throwing up all over her when she wakes up. She’ll want her Doctor, not a complete wreck. Capiche?”

The Doctor let out a sigh, knowing Jack was probably right. “Got it.”

“And I don’t want you sleeping with her tonight. We’ll just look over her in shifts and she’ll be fine,” Jack said.

He swallowed. “Yeah, okay.”

When they entered the Torchwood hub once again, everyone was sitting around a table and playing cards except for Gwen. The Doctor’s head was already starting to tingle a bit. “Poker?” Jack asked, rubbing his hands together and grinning. “Count me in. I kick Ianto’s ass every time we play,” he added to the Doctor with a sly smile. “Want to play?”

The Doctor cast a quick glance down the hallway. Nothing had changed with Rose yet. Gwen was watching her. Surely just playing a round or two would be fun? Jack had said that Rose needed him at his best. That was absolutely true.

“Ten quid, Jack,” the Doctor said proudly an hour later, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms across his face.

“Didn’t think you’d have a good poker face,” Jack mumbled, producing the money from his pocket and tossing it at the Doctor. “Didn’t even know you knew how to play.”

The Doctor scoffed. “I’m good at every game. Poker is simple to me. My people invented this, you know. We invented chess, too.”

“I’m going to go check on Gwen really fast,” Jack said, standing up from the table.

Everyone at the table nodded and the Doctor began collecting all of the cards to shuffle them and start a new game.

“DOCTOR!” Jack’s voice bellowed down the hallway and the Doctor sprinted over there before anyone else had even blinked.

Gwen lying on the floor was the first thing Jack had noticed, a small trail of blood flowing from her nose. Jack sprinted over to her as soon as he entered the room and checked her for signs. After shaking her gently a few times she awoke. Jack helped her up and told her to go rest in the living room for now. Then, his attention turned to the Doctor.

“Doctor, my head… God, my head…”

“I know,” the Doctor replied simply. He stared at Rose.

Rose’s heartbeat had increased dramatically, and her right hand was twitching slightly. The Doctor grabbed her hand in his and studied her face quickly with his eyes. They were moving marginally under their lids. Owen was by his side in an instant.

“It’s an acute stress reaction,” the Doctor said immediately, seemingly sure of his words. “Or something similar, at least.”

Owen rushed over to a screen and began punching in keys. Jack took a spot by Rose and began stroking her hair calmingly. “Rose? It’s me, Jack. Jack Harkness?”

“She’s waking up from a coma,” the Doctor explained. “She might not respond to stimuli for hours or days. It varies from person to person.”

“Doctor,” Owen called his attention over to a screen. “She’s having a fight or flight reaction. Jesus, my head is killing me…”

The Doctor clenched his teeth. This was definitely not a good situation. Her heartbeat – judging it by the fact that she was a Time Lady – was far too fast. Her breaths were coming out in heaves and her stomach was rising up and down rapidly. Beads of cold sweat were beginning to form on her forehead.

“I can fix her sympathetic nervous system if I go into her head,” the Doctor said, unsure of what to do. “I can’t take a look at her adrenal medulla, but if I can calm her nervous system the reaction should stop. Just not the after effects.” Before, the connection he had made with her was barely a touch. But this… This would be delving into her mind completely. And without permission.

Jack stared up at him, his gaze unsettling. “Do it, Doctor.”

Swallowing, the Doctor approached Rose swiftly and placed two fingers to each of her temples. He delved into her mind in one quick swoop, uncomfortable from the alarmed reaction her mind had against his. He found her sympathetic nervous system with ease, after all it was practically shooting up the mental equivalent of flares in her mind, and he sent all the calming thoughts he could towards it. The nerves began to calm down and he let out a sigh of relief. Physically, he could hear the cardiac monitor slow down to a far more normal place.

The length of the remainder of the coma was impossible to determine from her mind. But he could definitely see her thoughts. Memories of her life were fleeting about wildly. He saw himself losing her in the Battle of Canary Wharf, he saw her doing her homework and getting madly frustrated at it as a ninth grader. He saw the first night she had slept over at Mickey’s flat… And… Well… The Doctor would never mention to her that he had seen that. God, he wished he could wipe his memory now. That was not pretty.

He removed his fingers from her temples and shuddered at the loss of the connection. Looking up, blinking, he realized he had been connected to her for a solid five minutes, despite the fact that it had only felt like a few seconds. “Is she stable?” he asked Owen, not really caring what his answer was since the Time Lord was rushing over to look at the readings himself.

“Yeah. Whatever you did worked. Her heartbeat is still a tad bit faster than it was when she was in her comatose state before, though. I think something happened.”

The Doctor ran a hand through his hair. “She’s probably waking up. Most comas, well, regeneration comas anyways, last about two days to two weeks. This one is special, though… I’ve never heard of a Time Lord or Lady going into a fight or flight reaction while in a regeneration coma.” He puffed out a breath, sitting down beside Rose. “There’s not much we can do except wait for her to wake up and keep her stable.”

After a moment, he continued. “I’ll enter her mind daily and make sure the loss that she just sustained won’t grow worse.”

“Loss?” Jack questioned, frowning at Rose and continuing to stroke her hair comfortingly. “What kind of loss?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor admitted, sounding frustrated. “It could be a physical ability that she’s lost, or it could be some memories. Dissociative amnesia is common in regenerative comas. Temporarily, hopefully. It could be worse… Could be eating, talking, walking… There’s no way of knowing. It doesn’t seem too bad, though, from what I could see. I think she’ll be fine.”

The room was silent apart from the steady beeping of the monitor. “I’m staying with her tonight,” the Doctor vowed, looking Jack straight in the eyes and daring him to argue. “The headaches should be less painful since her mind is in a calm state currently. 

“Doctor…” Jack pleaded.

“I don’t need sleep tonight,” the Doctor reminded him. “Time Lord.”

“Let me stay with you,” Jack compromised.

After a moment, the Doctor made a vague hand gesture and sighed. “Fine. But if your head starts hurting too bad, you leave. Have you got that?”

Jack nodded, though he didn’t seem too trustworthy.

“How is Gwen?” the Doctor asked Ianto, who had been with her a moment before.

Ianto frowned. “She should be fine. She said she was just sitting with Rose and then everything went black. She has no idea what happened. Her head hurts really bad, though.”

The Doctor muttered something unintelligible before telling Ianto to give her an ice pack and to alternate between hot and cold on her forehead. Also, he should definitely check for signs of a concussion. It was unfortunately likely that she had one.

“Do you think I can have a moment alone with her?” the Doctor asked the other people in the room in a tone that wasn’t too harsh yet it wasn’t too kind either. It was somewhere in between. But it appeared he didn’t have to ask twice.

Once everyone had left the room, the Doctor sat by the bed again and took her hand in his. It was possible, if she was in some sort of a coma and was beginning to awake, that her mind would be able to process words. The headache wasn’t as bad as it had been when he first entered the room. He could only assume that what had made Gwen pass out was the sudden mental distress from Rose upon her waking. Well, sort of waking.

“Rose,” he said gently, brushing the pad of his thumb across her palm in intricate patterns.

“Please wake up. It’s been a while, huh?” His face broke out into a sad smile. “I’d love to know how you got here. Not that I really care. I just care that you are here…” God, he realized just how cheesy he sounded. A part of him wished she wasn’t hearing his words just for that very reason. “I thought I’d never see you again, you know? I really didn’t… But you did it, somehow, Rose. You got here somehow. It’s no coincidence.” He laughed. “I should have known you’d make it back to me. You’re just stubborn like that.”

He stared at her for a minute, one hand cupping her cheek delicately and the other remaining on her hand. “Rose Tyler… I…”

Damn it.

He still couldn’t say the words. Not even when she was in a bloody coma in front of him and in mortal danger. He wanted to walk over to the nearest wall and bash his head into it until he regenerated. Why couldn’t he say them? This was ridiculous. They both knew how he felt about her. And he had been so close on that stupid beach… Just a few seconds more and he would have…

No. He was a coward. Always had been, always would be. His cowardice was practically tangible when it came to Rose Tyler. He couldn’t dwell on these thoughts now though. First, she needed to wake up. Then, he could deal with his human-like feelings towards her.

He had to have priorities.


	4. Chapter 4

Rose lay in the medical bed that, by now, she basically owned, and Jack and the Doctor sat in chairs across from each other, both not quite knowing what to say. “So what happens afterwards, Doctor?”

The Doctor looked up and his eyebrows darted upwards. “What do you mean, what happens afterwards?”

“Rose wakes up, she’s a Time Lady. Say we figure out how she became one, or we don’t find out. What happens then? Do you ditch Donna? Stay with both of them? Can you finally be with Rose properly?” Jack asked, folding his arms across his chest and tipping his chair backwards slightly.

“I don’t know,” the Doctor admitted. “I don’t know what happens afterwards. I think taking this one day at a time is the best approach.”

“Doctor, when did you last eat?” Jack asked.

The Doctor sighed. “You don’t need to fret over me, Jack. Trust me, I don’t need you as my mother.”

Jack rolled his eyes. “Just answer my question, Doc.”

“When we went to the chippy shop.”

“Go grab breakfast. I’ll stay with her.”

The Doctor shook his head. “I’ll grab breakfast but you need to switch shifts with somebody else. Your head must be killing you. Get Martha or Donna.”

Jack nodded. “I’ll ask one of them. Come on, let’s get you breakfast.”

“I’ll wait until you get one of them,” the Doctor suggested. “I’m not leaving Rose alone.”

Jack left the room with a subtle nod. Of anyone in the universe who had ever been sick or hurt or injured, Jack was sure that Rose Tyler was getting the best treatment ever. The Doctor was like a puppy during a thunderstorm the way he clung to Rose.

He found Donna in the Torchwood kitchen, nursing a cup of tea. “Donna, you mind taking a shift with Rose? The Doctor needs breakfast and my head is hurting.”

Donna smiled and stood up. “Sure, I don’t mind.”

The Doctor entered the kitchen a few minutes later, stretching his arms back behind his head. “What’s for breakfast?” he asked Jack, who was at the stove making something.

“Omelets. Sound good?”

He plopped himself down in a wooden chair and reclined his legs on the wood. “Molto bene.”

The Doctor and Jack ate their omelets in silence, only breaking it to discuss the thrilling subjects of how delicious the omelets were and what the weather was like outside lately. It felt as though they were skirting around the elephant in the room, even though neither of them really had anything productive to say about the topic of Time Lady Rose Tyler.

“Are you happy, Jack?” the Doctor said after a minute, sipping some tea he had made previously.

Jack nodded. “Yeah, I am. I like my team, like my job… I’m happy.”

The Doctor nodded, seemingly letting this information set in. “Good. That you’re happy, I mean. You deserve it, you know.”

“Thank you.”

“Mm.”

 

The Doctor entered the medical bay, books piled up in his arms. Donna gave him a skeptical look. “How’s it going?” he asked her, smiling and sitting down beside Rose, placing the books on her bed next to her shoulder.

“Good. What have you got there?” Donna replied.

He looked at the books. “These? The Harry Potter series. Figured I’d read them to Rose. She should be able to pick up some audial stimuli in her current state, so the sound of me reading might relax her a bit.”

“Alright,” Donna said, leaning back in the green cushion chair that had been pushed into the room at one point or another. “Read to me, Doctor.”

The Doctor flipped open the first book in the saga and got up from the chair to lay next to Rose. He pulled his glasses out of his pocket and placed them on his nose, staring up at the words. “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Pivet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” 

An hour later, Donna was asleep and the Doctor was still reading. His voice was beginning to grow tired, something that seldom occurred. He shut the book and placed it on a table, content to just lie next to Rose for a short while and watch her stomach rise and fall.

Donna wasn’t normally one for mid-day naps, so he wondered just how much sleep she had gotten last night. He walked over to the chair and shook her shoulder gently. “Donna?”

“What do you want?” she complained, swatting at his head.

“You can go to bed or the couch if you like, there’s no need for you to stay in here with me and Rose.”

Donna nodded. “Yeah, okay.” Then she was gone.

The Doctor lay next to Rose again, staring at her face. “Well, just you and me again, Rose.”

Stunningly, she did not reply.

“Did I ever tell you about how I stole the TARDIS?” he asked her. Again, surprisingly, there was no reply from her side. “Just took it and ran away. I was planning to give it back, well, sort of… She was sort of broken, anyways. Chameleon circuit won’t work. Tried to fix it once or twice but she absolutely refused. I think she likes it that way.”

His hand was curled up comfortably in Rose’s and he sighed. “I like it that way, too. The police box form suits her. Don’t know why. Anyways, I was planning to return it. Didn’t ever get the chance to, mind you, but it’s like you lot say, it’s the thought that counts.”

He stared at her face, as if expecting some miracle reply. “This is a really one sided conversation, you know. Hmm. What else haven’t I told you yet? Well, I’ve been travelling with Martha and Donna. Both of whom you met, er, sort of… More like they met you. Again, sort of…”

“They’re great, you’d love them both. They’d both love you, too. And I’m with Jack again and his team. Remember Jack?” The Doctor brushed a tendril of hair out of her face and stroked her cheekbone with his thumb softly. “I met Shakespeare with Martha. That was rather fun. Never meet your heroes, though, Rose. Doesn’t always work out. He flirted with me! Can you imagine?”

Her finger twitched in his hand. The Doctor bolted upright. The heart rate monitor increased swiftly. He was still sitting on the bed, leaning over her with his hand still on her face. “Rose, wake up! It’s me. It’s the Doctor. Wake up, Rose. You’re so close!”

Martha entered the room, jogging over to the bedside. “Did something change? What happened?”

“I felt her hand move,” he explained. “Her heartbeat increased.” The Doctor stroked her hair quickly, attempting to coax her out of sleep. “Rose, Rose, please, it’s the Doctor. Wake up, Rose.”

Soon, Jack and Owen were around the bed as well. “She’s waking up,” Jack said breathlessly.

They all stared at her, nobody daring to get closer to her. The Doctor sat by her side; scanning her face intently and occasionally letting his eyes flicker to the nearby monitor.

Then, they heard a gasp.

Rose opened her mouth widely, her chest and head arching forward off of the bed slightly. A large breath of air entered her and then exited her as her chest moved up and down rapidly. Her eyes were moving underneath their lids and her hands were tightening into fists.

“My head,” Jack complained loudly through gritted teeth.

The Doctor’s head felt as though it was about to implode. Pain was erupting from behind his temples and all around the perimeter of his skull. He felt as though it was about to turn to mush and he would collapse and (possibly) regenerate. However, he kept his tight firm on Rose’s hand. “Rose, wake up, calm down. Try to relax your thoughts.”

Her back and head fell back onto the bed but she was still taking in heaving breaths as if she could hardly breathe. “D… Doc…” she hissed, arching her head forward again in pain.

“Rose,” the Doctor laughed breathily, resting his forehead against hers. “You need to calm down, Rose. You’re hurting us. Just calm your thoughts, okay?”

Her breathing appeared to slow and she squeezed his hand hard. “Doctor?...” Rose whimpered quietly, her eyes still shut firmly.

“You’re safe,” he breathed against her, keeping his forehead pressed against hers. “I’m not going anywhere, Rose. You’re safe, you hear me?”

The Doctor felt his own headache die down as Rose’s breathing slowed. Eventually, her eyes opened. They were just as brown and beautiful as he had remembered them. He felt as though they were in a rough, harsh cataclysm and they were just now beginning to see the light together.

He stared down at her, face breaking out into a smile. He was just so damn happy and the pain pounding behind his skull was numbing and it was half from his pure glee and half from the fact that she was sentient and staring at him and smiling right back up at him.

“Hello,” Rose breathed, and it was quite possibly the most beautiful sound he had ever heard.

The Doctor beamed down at her, wrapping one arm around her back and keeping the other one firmly set in her hand’s grip, refusing to let go. “Hello, Rose.”

She coughed, rather violently, but he didn’t pull away. “Been a while,” she said so quietly he was sure nobody else in the room heard it.

“Mmm,” he hummed in agreement. “Quite a while.”

“Doctor, I’m really tired,” Rose mumbled softly, nuzzling her head into his neck.

“Sleep,” he said gently, smiling. He could feel tears wanting to form in his ducts but he held them at bay.

Her long eyelashes fluttered close and a small smile was still playing on her lips. “Will you be here when I get up?”

He nodded, though she couldn’t see it. He swallowed past a lump of emotion forming in his throat and it was painful for him to form a single syllable. “Yeah. I’ll be here.”

It was as if Rose took that as her cue to fall asleep again, for her breathing evened and her hand’s tight grip in his loosened until it was limp. The Doctor sat up, keeping his hand wound in hers, and looked around at everyone staring blankly at him and Rose.

“So she’ll be okay?” Jack asked, breaking the silence.

The Doctor nodded. “Yeah.” He swallowed. “I think she will be.”

A couple hours later, everyone had filed out except for him and, of course, Rose. He lay next to her, staring intently at her face and wondering how on earth time, the thing that he was supposed to be lord of, was so incredibly slow.

He knew she couldn’t hear him at this point; she was in an unbreakably deep sleep mixed with the aftermath of a coma, so she may as well have been under twenty thousand different types of sleeping pills.

“Rassilon, I’ve missed you,” he said suddenly, feeling all of his emotions barreling forward like waves. He wouldn’t cry, of course he wouldn’t cry, but he allowed himself this moment, wrapped up in her and listening to her two hearts beating underneath his ear.

There was a coughing from the doorway. “Bad time?” Captain Jack asked.

It was sort of a bad time, but he wasn’t about to tell him that. “Not at all,” he said, smiling brightly at him. “Hello, Jack! Why aren’t you with the others?”

“Figured I’d check up on you two,” he said with a small smile. “I’m glad she woke up. Even if it was just for a bit.”

The Doctor nodded. “She should wake up for longer and longer periods of time as this progresses. At least, that’s my medical opinion. It is Rose though, and she loves her sleep. Some mornings on the TARDIS I had to go into her room eleven times to wake her up again and again and again and again and again and again and again…”

Jack scoffed. “Trust me, I remember.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Will you travel with us?” the Doctor asked hopefully, looking up at Jack.

There had been a time where he was reluctant to be anywhere near Jack. After all, he was still a temporal anomaly. He was still… Wrong. But two Time Lords and an immortal could be a pretty unbeatable team. Plus, he’d come to admire Jack for being able to stay positive after so many hard years. That had been something he hadn’t even been able to do himself. That was, up until Rose Tyler came along.

“Depends on how lovey dovey you two are,” Jack muttered. “Maybe wait a few weeks then come pick me up for a couple of trips.”

The Doctor frowned. “What do you mean it depends on how lovey dovey we are? Do you mean me and Rose?”

Jack let out a small chuckle and dragged a chair over to the medical bed, sitting down with his chest facing the back of the chair and his legs on either side. “Listen, Doc, there’s something you’re going to have to prepare yourself for. Something I don’t think you have thought about yet.”

The Doctor let out a humorless laugh. “I think I’ve thought about everything. Time Lord brain, remember?”

Jack ignored him. “Imagine Rose wakes up, you two begin travelling together. Two Time Lords, yeah?”

“Well, she would be a Time Lady,” the Doctor pointed out.

“Right, whatever. A Time Lord and a Time Lady, yeah?”

The Doctor nodded.

Jack sighed, resting his head on his chin. “There’s no easy way to put this. She’s going to want you, Doctor.”

“Want me? What do you mean?” the Doctor asked, frowning.

“Sexually.”

The Doctor blinked. “Oh.”

“Yeah, oh. So you’re going to have to gird yourself for that, because she doesn’t deserve to have you reject her. And things won’t be able to continue on the way they used to.”

He shuffled in his seat. “Why not?”

“Because, before,” Jack began, “there was an excuse. You were going to outlive her. It would hurt too much if you lost her. There was a reason for you two to not have sex every other hour, even though it was obvious that that was basically all you both ever thought about.”

The Doctor turned pink at the ears and turned his head away from Jack in a lame attempt to hide his blushing. “Jack, you know we’re not…”

“Just let me talk,” Jack interrupted. “Before there was an excuse, but now? Now you’re both in the same boat. Both not going to die for hundreds of years or so. There’s no more excuse. There’s no more running away, Doc. If you screw this up, you’ll regret it. And don’t tell me you don’t want her like she wants you, because I know that’s not true.”

“Jack, I think you’re exaggerating slightly.”

Jack sighed. “Doctor, I’ve listened to that girl drunk. When someone is drunk you learn a lot about him or her. She loves you, you know.”

His mind floated back to a beach scene… The Doctor swallowed, averting his gaze to her face. He hadn’t been able to say the words back to her then. He couldn’t now. “I do know,” he said in a quiet voice.

“So are you ready for all of that? Because if not, you might want to become ready. Not trying to pressure you or anything, Doc. This is just a warning.”

Without waiting for an answer, Jack clapped him on the back and left the room.

The Doctor tugged the blanket that was over Rose further over his body and lay on his side, staring at her face with a solemn expression. His eyes darted across her features time after time, memorizing each little detail. The size of her eyes, the shape of her nose. Every insignificant little crater and bump.

Then, before he really knew what he was doing, he was touching her. His thumb was on her plump pink lower lip, running across it gently. His other hand moved to her hair and he ran his fingers through the long blonde strands, committing to memory the way they felt against his skin and exactly how long her hair was.

The tips of her hair were a bit browner than the rest and he guessed that she had let her hair revert back to its natural color for a while in Pete’s world.

The things Jack had said to him were haunting his mind, now. He imagined being in the TARDIS with Rose and kissing her hard after a particularly scary adventure or hugging her tightly after a fun one. He imagined being in her bedroom, pressing her down into the mattress and running a few of his fingers along the entire course of her naked body. He imagined the vibrations when she would shiver from the cold touch of his skin on hers and the way each and every body part she possessed would look unclothed.

The Doctor shook the thoughts out of his mind and tried to relax himself. Jack couldn’t possibly be right. They would be able to be together just as they had been, best and complete mates.

He twirled her hand around in his and watched the way her fingers bent. A small voice in the back of his mind was like a four year old – consistently asking him the same word over and over again: Why?

Why couldn’t he be with Rose in every way that he wanted to?

Perhaps Jack was right.

Because before, before he had had his reasons, but now what excuse was there, really? Why was some strange feeling growing in the pit of his stomach and refusing to leave like a bad rash? Why was there a feeling of dread from his head to his toes?

Oh, right, he was terrified.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose wakes up and the Doctor is apprehensive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you like this chapter!!! It's a bit on the shorter side but is pretty action-packed. :)

When the Doctor woke up, it was to the sound of people talking.

“An entire year?” Donna was saying, laughing.

“A whole year,” another voice said. It was a voice so achingly familiar yet so unfamiliar at the same time.

He saw Donna smiling at him through his half open eyes. “Look who decided to join the party,” Donna said, grinning brightly.

“What?” the Doctor groaned, the lights on the ceiling far too bright for his liking. He raised a hand over his eyes in an attempt to block out some of the threat. “Who are you talking…”

He took into account his situation.

His arm was around someone, Rose, he remembered quickly. Memories came flooding back. His arm was around Rose and his body was pressed up against hers. His muscles felt achy and sore – he had been sleeping far more than necessary lately due to all the laying next to Rose. She was rather comfortable, after all.

His eyes scanned the room quickly and he noted that nobody else was in there except for him, Rose, and Donna. Then he noted that Donna had been having a conversation with someone who wasn’t him.

The puzzle pieces began to fit together in his mind. His hand, splayed across Rose’s stomach, could feel the normal rise and fall of her chest. The normal rise and fall of her chest.

She was awake.

Rose spun around to face him under his arm and it all seemed so surreal, he was waiting for someone to pinch him to wake him up. She was smiling brightly at him, illuminating the entire room so brightly he wasn’t even sure if the lights were on or if it was just her. Her chocolate eyes sparkled with delight and she extended her arms weakly for a horizontal hug.

The Doctor, without words, pulled her close to him, burying his head in her shoulder and trying desperately to contain all of the emotions running through him. She was here and she smelled like vanilla and some sort of cocoa powder and everything good and nice and kind in the world. He increased his grip on her, not ready to let go, not sure if he would ever be ready to let go.

Her hair was a sharp contrast to the rough stubble on his chin but he enjoyed the difference all the same. “Can’t breath,” Rose whispered in a strained voice.

The Doctor let her go, then, and stared at her in wonder, laughing at nothing in particular. “Rose,” he said in awe, licking his lips.

“Long time no see,” Rose replied, poking her tongue out of her teeth.

He laughed harder at that as if it were a hysterical joke and he pulled her close to him again, this time it wasn’t so much of a hug as a simple reassurance that yes, she was here, she was real and no, she wasn’t going anywhere.

“I missed you,” Rose mumbled into his ear, her mouth so close he could feel the warmth of her breath against the shell of it.

The Doctor let out a heavy sigh and collapsed next to her, keeping his eyes transfixed on her face. He wasn’t sure he could look at anything else, anyways. He tried for a moment, using all of his brain’s capacity to order his eyes to look somewhere else. It didn’t work.

She was so stunningly beautiful.

“I missed you too,” he replied.

Rose kissed his cheek and he felt himself flush, and immediately he began trying to control his body’s actions. After a moment, he realized he didn’t really care and focused on her instead. “You’re still you?”

The Doctor nodded, swallowing hard. Images of the Racnoss, the Master, and mainly Jenny flashed through his minds. “Yeah,” he decided after a moment, his voice coming out shakier than he had intended. “I’m still me.”

They were both silent for a moment, seemingly caught up in scanning each others features as if looking for any differences. The Doctor scrunched up his eyebrows in concern. “How long have you…”

“About an hour,” Donna answered before he could finish. He remembered she was in the room and looked up at her over top of Rose. “I suggested we wake you, but she didn’t want to.”

He stared at Rose and she simply grinned sheepishly. He couldn’t bring himself to be mad for a single second. “I don’t really need sleep that long, you know,” he teased.

“You were sleeping like a brick,” Rose retorted, poking him in the chest.

The Doctor glanced up at Donna, then back at Rose. “What have you two talked about?”

The two women exchanged knowing looks. “Oh, you know,” Rose said, her voice taunting, “nothing.”

The Doctor blinked as they exchanged more looks. “What did you… Was it about me?”

He ran a hand through his hair to ruffle it and Rose burst out into laughter. “He does still do that!” Rose said, turning to Donna, who was also clutching at her stomach.

The Doctor pouted. “What do I still do?”

“The hair ruffling when you’re frustrated!” Rose said, grinning at him. When she saw his pout, she ran her hand through his hair. “Oh, we’re just messing with you.”

He would have stopped pouting and made a witty retort by now, but he was far too focused on the way she was rubbing his head. When she pulled her hand away he guessed he must have cringed slightly, because moments later it was back, her thumb rubbing his scalp in comforting circles.

He appreciated the gesture. It was a constant reminder that she was here and alive and well. While on that train of thought, he asked the obvious question: “How are you feeling?”

“Funny,” Rose answered. “I don’t… I haven’t really had time to think about what’s going on with me, I guess.”

“Has… Has Donna told you anything?” the Doctor asked, biting his lower lip slightly.

Rose shook her head sadly. “A lot of my body is numb. I can’t move some of it too well; it’s sort of like dead weight. That’s about all I know.”

“I told her that you should give her the medical briefing,” Donna explained upon his confused glance in her direction.

The Doctor nodded. “Yeah. I’m going to need to run a lot of tests, a lot of scans. Take some blood again, sorry. I know you’re not the biggest fan of that.”

Rose scrunched up her nose.

The Doctor stood up and was about to set to work when he felt her grabbing his forearm. He looked over his shoulder and saw her staring at him desperately. “Can we do the tests a little later? I want to see Jack and everyone.”

Clenching his teeth, the Doctor glanced around the room hopelessly. He couldn’t say no, but he couldn’t say yes either. Everything was happening too fast. Her current condition hadn’t proved to be stable and she had just gotten out of a coma. And that comment about parts of her body feeling like dead weight definitely hadn’t done anything to appease his tension.

Then there was the main issue. The two hearts. From what he had gathered from Donna’s pitiful expressions and the way Rose talked in such a tranquil manner about her condition, Rose didn’t realize that yet. It was possible, if unlikely that she hadn’t noticed.

Her senses would be sharper if she was a true Time Lady, but she probably hadn’t noticed that yet either. Along with a lot of other differences that he would have to explain to her later.

Rose seemed to notice his tension. “Doctor, I’m fine.”

She wasn’t, he realized. She honestly wasn’t. How had she even gotten here? There were so many questions and yet she was staring at him with such big, pleading eyes… He was at a loss of what to do.

“Come here,” she said, patting the spot beside him.

Rose tried to sit up and he was vaguely surprised by how quickly Donna had gotten out of her chair to help her. The Doctor sat next to her, feeling a type of vulnerability he hadn’t felt in quite a while.

Donna and Martha were incredible; there was no doubt in that.

But neither of them had been able to see through him like he was made of glass in the way that Rose Tyler did.

He sat down next to her, trying desperately to cover up his emotions but knowing he was probably failing miserably.

Something else Rose Tyler tended to do: make him completely lose his sense of being.

He’d have to start a list of all the things she did (specifically to him) that nobody else seemed to be able to do. It would probably be infinite.

“Doctor, listen, okay?” Rose said gently, her hand resting on his comfortingly. Her index finger was tracing intricate patterns on the back of his hand and he stared at it, mesmerized. “I’m healthy, and I feel fine. My head was messed up when I first woke up, my memories are a little blurry from that, but it’s better now, too. Tests can wait, yeah?”

“But what if…” His voice trailed off as he forced himself to think about the possibility from a more medical and less personal perspective. His eyes fell shut. “What if your condition isn’t stable? You could slip back into a coma.”

Rose smiled slightly and kissed him on the cheek again.

She didn’t used to do that, when they traveled together before. Was this going to become a common occurrence? He sure hoped so. He randomly became aware of the fact that he hadn’t shaved ever since he had arrived at Torchwood. He probably should do that so Rose could kiss smooth skin instead of stubble. Unless, maybe she liked it better this way. Maybe that was why she was kissing him.

That was probably a thought that could wait until later.

“I won’t,” she assured him. “I’m kind of tired, that’s about it.”

He wasn’t completely reassured, but he nodded slowly. “I’m going to talk to them first. I don’t want you to become overwhelmed, yeah?”

Rose poked her tongue out of her teeth in that lovely smile of hers again. “Alright, whatever you think is best, Doctor.” She accentuated his name with a small wink and he felt himself flushing again, so furiously this time that he had to twirl around faster to hide his face.

~

After a quick debriefing to Jack, Martha, and the Torchwood team, he let them all in the medical bay. They surrounded Rose’s bedside and Jack instantly gave her a hug, being careful with her somewhat frail body.

“Jack!” Rose said cheerfully, pecking him on the lips. “I’ve missed you.”

Jack made a ‘MWAH!’ sound as he kissed her again, before pulling away and resting his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve missed you too, Rosie.”

Nobody missed the way the Doctor tensed. However, nobody commented on it either.

“I remember you, sort of,” Rose said, pointing at Martha. She smiled brightly. “When I came here, to this dimension, I mean, it was you. You found me.”

Martha nodded happily. “Martha Jones. The Doctor has talked a lot about you.”

Rose quirked an eyebrow playfully at the Doctor. “Has he?”

Changing the subject, the Doctor rubbed his hands together and sat next to Rose, taking her hand in his instinctively. “Speaking of. How did you get here, Rose?”

“I’d rather not talk about it right now,” was her simple reply.

The Doctor nodded after a moment. “Alright. Whenever you can.” What he really meant was he was dying to know how she had gotten here and how all of this had happened and whether or not there was a hole punched in the continuum of time and space.

Not that he really cared how she was here. It was more like how he cared about preserving the fact that she was here.

His Rose was a trouble magnet, after all.

“So how do you feel?” Jack asked. “Ready to get back into action?”

Rose gave him a short laugh before shaking her head regretfully. “Afraid not. Can’t feel some parts of my body. Yet, I hope.”

The Doctor scanned her with his eyes worriedly, itching to take a scan or an x-ray or something anything that would give him insight to her condition. Just simply hearing it and seeing the way she was laying was nowhere near enough for him, no, when it came to Rose Tyler’s wellbeing, he needed one hundred percent confirmation that she was okay.

“Physical therapy will help, right Doc?” Jack asked, glancing at the Doctor.

He nodded. “Yeah, it should.”

The rest of the Torchwood team and Rose mingled and she once again enthralled the Doctor. The way she could make friends so quickly and charm people almost instantaneously would never cease to blow his mind. He was leaning up against a wall, his arms folded across his chest as he watched and listened to her laugh, smile, talk, listen.

“You’re a lucky man, Doctor,” Jack said.

The Doctor turned, surprised to see Jack standing so close to him when he hadn’t even noticed him walking up. A person calling him lucky was definitely not something he was accustomed to. But, staring at Rose, he figured that he was extremely lucky. “Yeah, I am,” he sighed.

“Dying to run tests though, aren’t you?” Jack asked, amusement in his eyes.

The Doctor’s shoulders slumped slightly. “Just a bit. I’d just like to know that she’s not in imminent danger,” he explained.

From across the room he saw Rose yawn for the fourth time in the past five minutes, so he strolled over to her bed and raised his eyebrows. “Tired?”

She nodded. “Yeah, I am. How’d you know?” He opened his mouth to answer but she waved her hand, “Right, time sense and stuff, yeah?”

The Doctor laughed, nodding. “Yeah, sort of.”

Everyone left the room except for him. “Do you want me to stay?” he asked unsurely, shifting his weight from one foot to another.

“Well you don’t need to sleep tonight, right?” Rose said quietly.

Was that disappointment in her eyes?

He nodded. “I don’t. I don’t mind staying, though, either.”

“I’d love you to stay,” she beamed. Her smile was infectious and he soon found himself grinning, too. “Maybe just… Read to me?”

He glanced at the Harry Potter books that were still lying on a nearby table. “Harry Potter sound good, Dame Rose of the Powell Estate?”

She laughed. “It sure does, Sir Doctor of TARDIS.”

They laughed together, then, and for a moment, it was as if nothing had changed. It was as if they weren’t in the medical bay, she wasn’t recovering from a coma, and there weren’t four hearts between the two of them.

They were just the Doctor and Rose Tyler, the stuff of legends. As it should be.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose is told about her Time Lady DNA and takes it suspiciously well. The Doctor is desperate to understand her condition and has to figure out whether or not he can trust her.

While the Doctor read aloud to Rose, she pillowed her head on his chest and snuggled up right against him. His mind couldn’t focus in on the words, so his mouth simply read what his eyes were telling him to read, while his mind raced with thoughts about the many (most of them less innocent) possibilities of this position.

She was asleep within a few pages, and he had been meaning to do tests while she slept, but most of them needed to be done while she was sentient anyways and her head was still on his chest. It would be a crime to remove her from on top of him.

But there was still the problem of his sleeping. If he slept tonight, it would probably break the record for the longest amount of time he had spent sleeping in a week for the last… Two hundred years? Maybe? That was excluding regeneration comas (and the occasional comas of other types) of course.

So he lay, wide-awake and somewhat restless, while Rose let out the occasional content sigh and mainly just slept peacefully. He couldn’t ignore a lingering feeling in the back of his mind. It was the same desperation from earlier – the desperation to confirm her wellbeing. His curiosity ran wild with possibilities, all of which he had to mentally push away in order to remain sane.

He could undoubtedly feel her two hearts beating strong if he focused his hearing expertly. The noise was somewhat off-putting – he hadn’t heard the double beat of another Time Lord since…

That was a path he didn’t even want to go down.

~

The Doctor watched with amusement as she woke up. First, she shifted on top of him, wiggling in a way that had him using every last bit of self will to not yelp or react in any way. Then, her eyes fluttered open and she looked up at him, a grin gracing her features and making her look all the more beautiful.

“Doctor?”

He laughed and squeezed her to him. “Good morning.”

She nibbled on her lower lip, not moving her head from his chest. He didn’t mind. “You stayed,” she pointed out.

“’Course I did.”

Rose gave him a look that he didn’t have time to decipher because before he knew it her head was off of his chest and she was stretching out her limbs. “My head feels funny,” she mumbled, clutching at her head. “It’s like, this sort of… I can’t…” She shut her eyes and fell back onto a pillow. “It’s not painful - it’s just sort of…”

He knew exactly what she was talking about. He had been hoping to put off this talk for longer but she deserved to know what she was in for.

“A longing?” he asked. Rode bit her lip and nodded. “Rose, listen, about that medical debriefing… There’s something you need to know.”

Rose nodded slightly, looking somewhat apprehensive. “Yeah?”

“You’re a Time Lady, Rose,” he said, ripping the bandage off.

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

“That’s… Well. I’m okay with that,” she said.

The Doctor blinked. “You’re what?”

“I’m okay with that,” Rose repeated firmly.

Something was definitely wrong with this picture.

“What do you mean… You’re not, I don’t know, surprised?”

“I kind of guessed it already, I guess,” Rose shrugged. “But what’s going on with my head?”

The Doctor tried to work his mouth to form words but couldn’t. What was going on? How had she guessed that she was a Time Lady and not bothered to say a single thing about it? He couldn’t take this suspense any longer. “Rose, I think it’s about time you told me what happened in Pete’s World. Can you do that? Can you tell me how you got here?”

“My question first,” came Rose’s firm reply. “What’s going on with my head?”

He sat up and scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s the telepathy. Time Lords and Ladies, especially young ones, like you, are meant to bond with parents. Then, later, friends. Other family members. Lovers. It’s a sort of emptiness, I want to tell you it will go away but, well… It won’t.

“This is what you always have?” she asked, pointing towards her head. “Always?”

He nodded, sighing. “Yeah. You’ll get jaded to it - don’t worry. While you were sleeping, er, in your coma, everyone around you was getting nasty headaches. Don’t worry about it, nobody received permanent damage, but that was your mind reaching out for a bond. You weren’t sentient, technically, so you couldn’t think things through.”

“Oh.”

The Doctor blinked. She was taking this news far better than he had anticipated. If he was honest, she was taking it better than was possible. “If it starts to hurt or anything changes, tell me, yeah? And I want to run a lot of tests today, if that’s all right with you.”

Rose frowned. “Could we… Could we wait? Until tomorrow?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said apologetically, not sure he could put of the tests for another five minutes, albeit twenty four hours.

He made to stand up and walk over to the monitors, but he felt her small hand on his forearm, tugging him back towards the bed. Her brown chocolate eyes were staring up at him and, he thought, just for a moment, he saw a flicker of overwhelming fear in them. “Please?”

The Doctor let out a deep breath. “Rose, we need to do them today. I have no way of knowing whether or not your condition is stable. It’s… It’s bothering me. I have a weird feeling,” he admitted in a voice that came out far too hoarse for his liking.

“I’m fine,” she insisted stubbornly.

“Just a few? Simple ones? They will take thirty seconds tops, I promise,” he pleaded. “I just need you to cooperate, Rose. I can do some while you’re sleeping, if you’d prefer. But some need to be done while you’re awake.”

“Please, tomorrow,” Rose begged. “And I don’t want any while I’m sleeping.” The fear was now evident in her wide eyes.

The Doctor ran a hand through his hair. “Rose, why are you scared of having tests done?”

She smoothed her hair down with one hand. “I’m not.”

“When humans lie, they tend to copy the other person’s behavior,” he pointed out.

Rose had no words for that. The Doctor stood up and began pacing the room. Rose licked her lips. “Doctor, I just want to relax for a bit. I don’t want to think about all of this. I don’t think it’s good for you, either. Why can’t we just have a few tranquil days? Then we can worry about this stuff.”

The frustration boiling inside him was growing to its limit. Did he have to spell it out for her? Why couldn’t she see how bloody worried he was? The vagueness of her condition was bad enough, now he could add strange behavior to his stress list, along with a thousand other things.

“Because you just got out of a coma, Rose! We can’t just ignore this and go off and have adventures, all right? We have to deal with this.” He realized his voice was louder than he had intended and he sank into a chair, training his eyes on the floor. “Rose, listen. I can’t… I’m not sure I can lose you again.”

He realized he sounded like a kicked puppy and looked up at her. Her eyes were sympathetic. “Doctor, you’re not going to lose me.”

“How do you know?” he inquired.

“Because I’m here, and I’m back, and I’m okay. Can you just believe that? Can you trust me for a few days?” she asked gently. He noted that the rims of her eyes were slightly redder than they had been when she had woken up. Guilt struck him hard in the heart like a knife, and he swallowed.

Could he trust her? When it came to her own life? He hadn’t before – no, he had sent her away for her own good. This was for her own good, too. But what was he going to do? Physically force her to give him her blood? Strap her down beneath a scanner and hold her down there until he got the results he needed?

“I… I can trust you,” he said after a moment, his tone most likely laced with uncertainty. At least, that was how he was feeling.

Rose grinned brightly and opened her arms. “Come here.”

He did as she asked and sat down on the bed next to her, letting her embrace him in a somewhat weak hug. She mumbled into his ear, “Thank you.”

When they pulled away from each other, the Doctor forced himself to smile. “You must be starving. Up for breakfast?”

Rose nodded happily. “I’m not quite sure if I can walk yet though.”

“You have no physical injuries,” he assured her, “but you’ll need physical therapy, definitely. I’ll bring you breakfast, you can eat up, then we’ll start that, yeah?”

She smiled. “You’re the doctor.”

He beamed. “In every sense of the word.”

She pulled him close again in a random hug. It appeared to him that their hugs were more often occurrences now, and they tended to linger for longer periods of time. In fact, their general touching since she had returned had to have increased by at least fifty percent.

Not that he was complaining. Quite the opposite, in fact.

“I missed you,” Rose sighed.

“I missed you too. But when are you going to tell me about how you got here?” He pulled away and rested his hands on her shoulders. “I bet it’s quite the tale, Rose Tyler.”

He watched as her smile faltered before fading completely and the light left her eyes. Something in his hearts shattered, then, and he wasn’t quite sure if it was the look itself or the fact that he had seen that look so many times in the mirror, in every body that he had ever owned.

“Later,” he promised. “We’ll worry about that later.” In a hope to bring back some of the joy to her face he squeezed her hand. She gave him a thankful smile. “I’ll be right back with breakfast, yeah? Right back. Two minutes tops. Do you want me to get someone to wait with you?”

Rose rolled her eyes. “I think I can stay out of trouble for two minutes.”

The Doctor quirked an eyebrow. “That would mean you’ve improved since I’ve last seen you.”

She laughed at that and he left the room, giving her one last glance.

He should have been whistling while he was walking, feeling like a brand new man with everything he wanted in the world. But he couldn’t. Not when she was acting so… Not Rose.

She had never not opened up to him before unless it was about something stupid that didn’t matter, such as him having to pester her to get her to tell him her middle name (because it was oh so embarrassing, apparently) or her ex boyfriend Jimmy. But when it came to serious things, she always informed him.

Always.

Meaning this had to be pretty bad. That much was deductible.

And the scanning, he didn’t even know what was going on with that. She looked terrified of the prospect. He hadn’t seen anything wrong on her scan before (besides the Time Lady DNA) so what could be there (or potentially be there) that had her so scared?

Lastly, there was the species change.

Over the past nine hundred years of his life, he had seen quite a few things. This didn’t exclude species being changed. In fact, he had had it done to himself a few times with the Chameleon Arch, even in this body. But, normally, when something didn’t know it was getting a species change, and got one, it was normally quite the revelation. A shocking, angst-filled revelation. He was no exception – John Smith had been quite shocked when he had discovered that he was the human form of the Doctor.

So why was Rose taking it in such a graceful stride?

He wasn’t necessarily upset with her for that, more just curious. Had she already known it was happening before she had even gotten to this universe (which, by the way, wasn’t possible for her to even do. That was also bothering him immensely).

The Doctor groaned as he made her breakfast, pouring her favorite cereal into a bowl and just enough milk on top. He added a couple of vitamins to the side for her health, praying that she would take them without complaint, and a chocolate chip cookie simply because he could.

When he entered the room again, it appeared Rose hadn’t found trouble (miraculously). She was staring at him and grinning. “Thank you,” she said as he placed a tray in her lap.

“So for the physical therapy, which parts of your body can you move?”

At least she appeared to be comfortable with this.

“My arms rather well. I wasn’t able to move them this well at all before. I think… I think I’m healing fast. Probably the Time Lady thing, yeah?”

He beamed. “Superior biology!”

Rose rolled her eyes and smacked him on the arm playfully. “Anyways, yeah, my arms are good. My legs are pretty iffy. Head is good. Um…” She experimentally tried to sit up. “Hips hurt pretty bad. So does my chest. It’s sort of just soreness, though, not numb. I think just my legs are numb, now.”

He nodded, taking in the information. “Like that cereal still?” he asked conversationally, sitting cross-legged across from her and feeling the corners of his mouth turn up. “I don’t think it’s the exact same kind, but Jack doesn’t keep the same cereal collection the TARDIS does, I’m afraid, and I didn’t want to take the time to go to her galley.

She hummed as she took another bite. “Love it. I didn’t realize how hungry I was until I started eating. But is it supposed to be all…” She made a gesture towards her mouth.

“Tasty?”

Rose hummed, taking another large spoonful, then another. “It’s amazing! More amazing than I remember, definitely. God, I could eat ninety bowls.”

He laughed, “That’s the new senses. Hearing, tasting, seeing, it should all be different for you now. But your body doesn’t want to overload your senses, so some of them might develop more slowly than others. Have you noticed anything else different?”

She stared at him, leaning forward slightly. “Yeah, my sight is better. Not significant, mind you, but better.”

The Doctor stared back at her, neither of them backing away. There were only a few inches of space between them and her lips looked so plump and pink and inviting and it would be so easy just to close that gap. It’d be so easy for him to show her her new sense of taste in touch in the most beneficial of ways for both of them.

Everything was just so accessible now.

Before, at times like this, he would remember the list. The list of reasons why they could never be together, but now that list was gone blowing in the void somewhere and there was just them left. No barriers, no obstacles. It was all so easy to think about yet so complicated at the same time, really.

“Good morning!” Martha said cheerily as she entered the medical bay.

Rose pulled away, leaning back against the bedframe and straining her neck to see Martha. “Hello!”

“Oh, he already brought you breakfast?” Martha said, nodding towards the tray in her hand with pancakes and scrambled eggs on it. “I’ll just take this back then, I guess.”

“I think I’ll take that too,” Rose said decidedly. “I’m really hungry for some reason. Must be part of that Time Lady thing.” She blinked at the Doctor, fear flashing in her eyes. “Will it affect my size? If I have to eat all the time constantly now?”

The Doctor shook his head pompously. “Superior metabolism! You don’t have to worry at all! That is, unless you get a regeneration with a larger, er, figure.”

That was one of many, countless, irritating topics that hadn’t yet been probed between them. Regeneration. In a hundred years would they both still be travelling together in different bodies?

An arrogant little voice in his head piped up: Would they even last that long together?

He shushed the voice mentally and returned his attention to Martha and Rose. “May want to slow down, Rose,” he said teasingly as she ate fork after fork of pancakes.

“They’re blueberry!” she exclaimed happily. “I never knew how good blueberries could taste! Does everything taste better?” Rose set her fork down and looked up at him excitedly. “Would everything feel different? When my senses are like, fully unlocked?”

“I wouldn’t say unlocked is the right word. You’re not exactly a superhero…” He began, trailing off at her glare. “Yes, everything will feel much different.”

She seemed happy about that as she ate a mouthful of scrambled eggs. Martha stretched out her arms in front of her. “Gwen is doing good, by the way. Fully recovered.”

The Doctor grinned. “Molto bene! She’s a tough one, Gwen Cooper.”

“What happened to Gwen?” Rose asked, looking up.

“Oh, it’s nothing. How are you feeling, Rose?” Martha asked, resting her hand on the other woman’s shoulder.

“Sort of…” She pursed her lips in thought. “Sort of amazing, actually. Everything feels amazing.” Rose ran her hand over the blanket. “Even this feels different. It’s like I can see each individual fabric. It’s weird. I can’t really explain it.”

“You’re going to need less sleep soon,” the Doctor said. “Three five hour nights a week for fully adult Time Lords and Ladies. For children it’s eight. Teenagers it’s seven.”

“Fifteen hours of sleep a week,” Rose muttered, shaking her head. “This is crazy.”

“Well, actually,” he said, flushing. Martha and Rose gave him a strange look. He rubbed at the back of his neck. “You’ll need twenty four hours a week. Technically, on Gallifrey, you would be considered a child.”

Rose laughed, “A child?”

“Only a day year old, really,” he teased, sticking his tongue out at her. “You have twelve regenerations.”

“There’s a limit? How many have you used up?”

“Er… Technically… I have two left.”

“Only two?!” Rose shouted, whacking him on the arm. He winced. “How do you only have two left?”

“I die. A lot. Normally in violent ways. You saw one of those violent ways,” he explained lamely, rubbing at his arm and pouting.

“So I can regenerate twelve times? That’s thirteen bodies, yeah? Including this one?”

He nodded.

“Oh my god, this is so weird. Much weirder than I ever thought about.”

Martha sighed. “I can’t even imagine what that is like.”

“Can we start physical therapy now?” Rose asked the Doctor eagerly. “I want to be able to walk. And run. I want to do a lot of running.”

The Doctor walked over to the side of the bed and extended his hand, wiggling his fingers. Rose placed the tray on the bed beside her and grabbed his hand happily, letting him help her swing her legs over the side of the bed.

“I’ll have you running in days,” he assured her.

“Is that a promise?”

Something twinkled in his eyes. “Oh yes.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose and the Doctor have a fight, and some of Rose’s secrets are revealed.

The physical therapy went well. Rose took several steps with no support and made it all the way to the Torchwood common area with the Doctor’s help. If he’s honest, the close contact and constant touching that the therapy required had his more easily excited bits, well, excited, causing him to maneuver himself in such a way that nobody would notice.

“I’m not tired,” Rose complained at his insistence that she get some form of rest, since she had been needing quite a bit of sleep lately and the physical therapy had probably exhausted her.

The Doctor sighed reluctantly. “Alright, then. What do you want to do?”

She gave him that brilliant smile, the one that made his hearts melt and beat faster, the one that fueled his optimism since she had gotten back to him. “A movie?”

“Rooose,” he complained. “We are most definitely not having you walk all the way to the TARDIS media room only to have you pass out on the couch a second later.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “Bet I won’t fall asleep as fast as you.”

He puffed out his chest, indignant. “You’re on. But I pick the movie.”

“No, I do,” she claimed, giving him a teasing smile.

They made it to the media room in far more time than it should have taken, due to getting sidetracked constantly and teasing and flirting and the likes.

Rose ended up picking The Hunchback of Notre Dame for their movie, insisting that she needed to watch a Disney classic. The Doctor fetched popcorn in record time, making it back to her side and handing her the bowl. Halfway through the movie, without warning, she tugged him down onto his side and lay in front of him. His arm instinctively moved around her stomach and his nose nuzzled carelessly into her hair, not bringing himself to care that he couldn’t see the television at all.

Everything went great until Quasimodo helped Esmeralda escape.

Rose darted upwards, suddenly, and coughed into her elbow. The Doctor watched her in concern as her coughs didn’t subside and a small fit turned into a moderate fit, which in turn amplified into a bigger fit. The sounds grew and grew until it sounded as though she could hardly breathe.

He sat up next to her and, without hesitation, scooped her up into his arms. He stood up and began walking as fast as he could towards the door when he felt her hitting his shoulder, still coughing slightly.

His hearts had been beating at a thousand miles per hour, his head clear of all coherent thoughts as he focused in on one goal: getting her to the medical bay now.

There was an indescribable gaping feeling in his stomach, as if someone had ripped a hole in him and there was no way to repair it. It was almost as if he was a ghost, not really there and this wasn’t really happening, it was just a bad dream that he would wake up from.

“Doctor stop,” Rose insisted. “I’m fine. Just choked on a piece of popcorn.”

He didn’t listen. He continued towards the medical bay and laid her down on the bed. Rose stood up immediately and stared at him with her arms folded across her chest. “Rose, let me run an x-ray at least,” he pleaded. “Just an x-ray. It’ll take moment, just a moment. Ten seconds.”

She rolled her eyes. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to trust me.” She scanned his concerned face. “Calm down! You’re overreacting, I just choked on popcorn! I’m fine, see?”

He saw fear in her eyes and he couldn’t take this for another second. “I’m overreacting? No, you’re underreacting. You just got out of a coma, Rose!”

“Why do you have to keep reminding me of that?!” she shouted. He saw tears forming in her eyes. “Why can’t we just pick up where we left off? It doesn’t matter that I just got out of a coma!”

The Doctor groaned and began pacing the room in frustration. “Of course it matters! This is life or death, Rose.”

“I’m a Time Lady,” she complained. “I can regenerate. There really aren’t life or death situations for me anymore.”

“Yeah, you know what, you are a Time Lady,” he spat angrily, stepping up to her where she sat with her ankles crossed on the medical bed. Such a casual position for such an unusual situation, he thought bitterly. His old Rose would have never done this. She would have talked to him, explained to him what was going on, and they sure as Rassilon would have worked it out by now.

He continued, “You’re a Time Lady, and you’re definitely not Rose Tyler. You’ve been acting different ever since you’ve gotten here. Why won’t you tell me what happened, Rose? Why won’t you talk to me? You used to talk to me. Answer some questions.”

He regretted the words the moment they came out of his mouth. He saw the first tear stream down Rose’s cheek and she stood up, her accent growing thicker as she grew angrier and a lump formed in her throat. “Maybe you’re not the same man I knew,” she accused. “What happened to you, Doctor? I thought you used to...”

She didn’t complete her sentence but he knew what she had been about to say anyways, and it hurt him more unsaid than said.

He held his tongue and lowered his voice to a firm one. “Rose, please, lay down and let me scan you.”

“No.”

He groaned in frustration, moving his hands away from his hair in fear that he would pull it all out in irritation. Then, making a split second decision, he whipped his sonic screwdriver out of his pocket and attempted to examine her with it, hovering it over her body. Her hand darted out and grabbed his wrist before he could activate it.

“Rose,” he begged, not fighting her grip even though he could easily break out.

She took in a deep breath. “Doctor, put the screwdriver in your pocket.”

He did as she asked hesitantly. “Can you tell me? Just tell me, Rose.” He took a look at her, a real look at her, and saw the fear evident in her features. Her hands were trembling slightly and tears were now streaming down her face. “I can tell that you want to,” he mumbled, placing two fingers under her chin.

She stepped away from his touch. “There’s nothing to tell.”

“Did something affect your mind?” he asked slowly. “Is something forcing you to say this?”

Rose’s lips were set in a form line and she shook her head. “It’s me, Doctor. Genuinely me. Please, can we just pick up where we left off?” He didn’t respond, so she took a step towards him experimentally and reached out, wiggling her fingers. “You know,” she encouraged, “Sir Doctor of TARDIS and Dame Rose of the Powell Estate? The old team?”

He still didn’t reply so her voice lowered to a whisper, her hand slowly withdrawing. “The stuff of legends?”

The Doctor considered her, his eyes searching hers for any sign of evidence. He knew he wouldn’t last forever with this uncertainty. But he wasn’t quite sure what choice he had. Perhaps if he could spend more time with her, study her, he could figure out who or what was messing around with her brain.

Or what was scaring her so much she was lying to him.

Or, perhaps, she was telling the truth. Maybe everything was all right and she just really, really didn’t want to bother with tests? No, that wasn’t true. There was something going on. He’d just have to figure it out without her help. For some reason, that particular thought sent goose bumps down his arms.

The Doctor grabbed her hand in his and squeezed it, offering a small, forced smile. “Yeah. The stuff of legends.”

Rose beamed brightly and pulled him into a hug. “When do you think we can go somewhere?” She pulled away but kept his hand in hers, toying with his fingers absentmindedly. “I’m dying to travel.”

“We’ll go when you’re healed up,” he promised. He was ready to leave Torchwood, more than ready, if he was honest. He liked Donna, Martha, Jack, and the others; he just wasn’t built to stay in one place – pure and simple. “Which shouldn’t be long.”

“Superior biology?” she asked, poking her tongue out of her teeth.

“Superior biology.”

Rose tugged on his arm, leading him towards the door. “Can we finish the movie?”

He stared at her intently. “Aren’t you tired by now?”

“Sort of,” she admitted. “I still want to finish it, though. We were at a good part.”

The Doctor shrugged, trying to act casual about his words, “You could sleep on the couch, maybe?” As stressed as he was about her condition, one thing he couldn’t complain about was the cuddling. He hadn’t cuddled this often in all the nine hundred years of his life, and he wasn’t quite sure he ever wanted to stop. It was a somewhat embarrassing and very unmanly thought, and he made a mental note to never tell Rose that.

However, Rose seemed to be able to read his thoughts, since she gave him an amused smile. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

~

“Thought I might find you in here,” Jack said from behind the Doctor, peering down on them on the couch.

The Doctor startled, wrapping an arm around Rose for protection instinctively and staring up at Jack with wide eyes. “You scared me.”

“Normally you’d hear me coming from a mile away, Doc,” Jack grinned, sitting down on a chair and propping his feet up on the coffee table, legs crossed at the ankles. “Senses dulling?”

“No, just…” He stared down at Rose and made a lame explanatory hand gesture.

Jack nodded. “Distracted. Right. How’s she doing?”

The Doctor wasn’t quite sure how to answer that. She might be doing awful and I wouldn’t know because she’s not telling me anything? She could be doing amazing and be completely right to be sour with me because I’ve accused her of lying? She’s doing great, how about you Jack? How’re the kids?

Instead, he just stared down at her in concern. “She won’t let me take tests.”

“Still?” Jack asked, eyes shooting to his hairline.

If there was anyone he could trust, despite how much he wanted to admit it, it was Jack. “Still,” he confirmed. “She says she’s fine, but…” His eyes squeezed shut, trying to block out the painful memory of their fight.

“You two had a fight?” Jack guessed, making a face. “Well looks like it ended well with your current position.” Jack nodded towards Rose sleeping with a small smile plastered onto her face with her bum firmly pressed up against the Doctor’s pelvis.

The Doctor felt himself turning crimson and he ducked his head. “Not quite. I just can’t stand not knowing what’s wrong.”

“Well, you can’t force her,” he replied with a frown. “Guess she’ll tell you about Pete’s World and all that in due time.”

“I’m impatient,” the Doctor admitted, fidgeting slightly as Rose snuggled further into him, letting out a content sigh as she wrapped an arm around him. The Doctor froze, looking at Jack helplessly.

Jack walked over and clapped the Doctor on the back carefully as to not wake Rose. “She’ll be fine, I’m sure. Anyways, everyone was talking about going out for lunch today. That’s why I came in here, actually. Figured I’d ask if you and Rose wanted to come with. I think it’d be good for her to get out for a while. Nothing extreme, just down the street.”

The Doctor hummed, brushing a strand of hair out of Rose’s face and staring at her as if asking her silently. “I think she’d like that. I don’t want to wake her, though.”

“We’re not leaving for another two hours, it’s only ten in the morning,” Jack assured him. “See you then.”

“See you,” the Doctor replied as he heard Jack’s footsteps fade away down the TARDIS’s corridor.

~

“Five more minutes,” Rose groaned, burrowing her face into something soft and warm. She clutched at the blanket with one hand, bunching it up in her fist. She heard an amused noise from above her and struggled to open her eyes and adjust to the bright light.

“Rose, that’s me,” the Doctor’s voice said above her.

She managed to look up at him, the light still hurting her eyes. His freckled face was beaming down at her and she smiled despite herself, running a hand through her mess of blonde hair. Glancing around briefly, she could see that they were on the TARDIS’s media room couch.

Right, they had been watching the Hunchback of Notre Dame. And they had had a fight.

Memories of the fight hit her hard like a baseball bat to the head and she shifted her weight before realizing why the Doctor’s face was so red. She was sitting on his lap. Rose’s eyes widened as she tried to crawl out of his lap and sit next to him instead, fumbling slightly in the process. “Sorry,” she mumbled.

“Everyone’s going down the street for lunch in an hour,” he began, ignoring the awkwardness of the previous situation. He ran a hand through his hair.

His hair was longer, she noted, wondering why she hadn’t taken as much notice of that before. It wasn’t significantly so, of course, but the strands stuck up slightly higher. He ran his hand through his hair again and she realized he could see her staring. “Oh, uh, are you going?”

“I will if you go,” he stated.

He hadn’t left her side since she had gotten back for more than five minutes, and she wasn’t quite sure how she felt about that. All the cuddling was amazing, of course, and he was amazing in general, but she did feel the need to get out and do something. “I’ll go,” she said, smiling. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to walk all that far, though.”

“I can carry you if necessary,” he offered without hesitation.

Rose imagined being on his shoulders while they walked through the streets of Cardiff and laughed a little at the image. The Doctor frowned, “What?”

“Nothing,” Rose said, shaking her head. “Thank you. I, um, I should shower,” she said, realizing that she hadn’t showered ever since she had gotten back. Rose wrinkled up her nose, wondering why the Doctor was willing to be in such close proximity with her.

The Doctor’s face paled slightly. “Are you sure you, uh, can?”

She certainly felt better than she had the day before. Rose rested her hand on his arm. “Doctor, I’m pretty sure I can shower on my own. Were you thinking about joining me?” Rose shot him a flirtatious look.

“Perchance,” he said, waggling his eyebrows.

Rose laughed again and stood up on somewhat wobbly legs, grabbing at his arm for support. He was giving her a look of pure apprehension, his face pale. “Just got sea legs,” she explained. “I’m fine.” The look lessened slightly, but she could tell he was simply putting a mask over it. “Really, Doctor, I am.”

She poked him in the stomach, “Trust, remember? I’ll tell you if I don’t think I can do something.”

He sighed. “Right. Sorry.”

He still looked nervous, so she relented. “You can wait outside the bathroom, yeah? While I shower, I mean.”

The Doctor didn’t respond with words, he just nodded tightly and held her hand while they walked to her bedroom together. Rose grabbed some clothes from her drawer and gave him a small smile before stepping into the bathroom. For some reason, she thought he looked rather out of place sitting on the end of her bed and wringing his hands.

She pushed that thought out of her mind and stepped into the en suite, turning the water onto a hot level and using the toilet quickly. Then, she stripped off her clothes and put them on counter before stepping under the hot water and trying not to groan in pleasure as it hit her skin.

She ran her fingers through her tangled hair – she hadn’t noticed just how messy it was until now. The shower felt different, somehow. Different than it had on Pete’s World or simply before she had left this universe the first time. After a moment, she decided it must be the Time Lady superior senses that the Doctor had been talking about, for she could sense each drop that hit and ran down her skin.

Experimentally, she closed her eyes and focused on listening. The shower sounded different, too. She could hear the pitter patter of individual drops if she listened hard enough. The smell was the same, perhaps a bit more extreme, but it was still just water and shampoo and soap.

When she stepped out, she wrapped a towel around herself and leaned over the sink to brush her teeth before putting on some basic makeup. As soon as she was done, she got dressed in a simple lime green jumper and a regular pair of jeans. Looking in the mirror, she felt more like herself. When she stepped out the door, the Doctor was in the same position she had left him in, looking up at her surprised - as if not expecting her to come out.

“Hello,” he said after a moment, smiling.

Rose looked at his hands and saw he was holding a picture frame from her nightstand of the two of them on Woman Wept, right after she had promised him forever. She grinned and sat down next to him, resting her head on his shoulder. “I like that picture.”

“So do I,” he replied, bringing the silver frame closer to her so that she could see it.

They both looked happy in it, and while she had been looking at the camera the Doctor had been looking at her. There was something in his eyes there – something that she couldn’t completely comprehend. She had stared at that picture, admittedly, several times before, focusing in on his expression.

“You look young in this,” he pointed out.

She smiled slightly. Nobody but them probably would have noticed the age difference between the picture and what she looked like now. But, to her, it was completely evident. “Yeah, I do.”

After a moment, she looked at him. “You look young, too.”

He laughed a little, and it sounded bitter. “I look the same. Don’t exactly age that fast.”

Rose raised a hand to his face, brushing the edge of his eye with her index finger. “Maybe not fast, but you do,” she mumbled quietly. “You’ve got crinkles that weren’t there before.” Her fingers moved lower to his cheek and she saw his eyes following them. “And more freckles, I think.” Then his chin. “And a bit more scruff.”

It moved back up his face to his hair. “Your hair is longer, too,” she said, voicing her earlier thoughts.

They were so close, now. It would be so easy for her to just reach out and kiss him. They were both on a rollercoaster without a single restraint and they were clinging to the car for dear life, praying that they would make it out alive. His eyes were hooded slightly, on the verge of falling shut, and she saw his tongue dart out to wet his lips and she wasn’t sure she could take this anymore.

But she couldn’t do this to him.

It wasn’t fair.

“Doctor,” she said, adding a slight warning to her inflection. He snapped out of it immediately, leaning away from her and adjusting his tie. “Should we get going?”

“We’ve got a bit, but we can go meet them in the hub,” he suggested, voice less enthusiastic than normal.

When he didn’t reach out to grab her hand, she initiated it. He seemed somewhat thankful, giving her a small smile and a look that unintentionally let her know they were going to pretend this had never happened. She wanted to believe she was okay with that, but she wasn’t.

They couldn’t do this – she knew they couldn’t do this. Nothing had changed; they were still just going to have to be at arm’s length with one another – that was the best way.

“Oh, I forgot my sweater,” she lied. He looked at her in concern as she walked the other direction down the corridor. “I’ll be right back,” Rose promised. “You go ahead.”

As soon as she was certain he was outside of the TARDIS and she was alone in her bedroom, she grabbed a tissue from the bathroom. Rose sat on the edge of her bed and coughed forcefully, her eyes squeezing shut as pain wracked her torso and left her with a slight tremble.

When she pulled it away from her mouth, a large, bright red blotch was on the thin, white paper.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose and the Doctor have a much needed talk and revelations are made - but things don't go as Rose had hoped they would.

It took Rose far longer than it should have to leave the TARDIS. The Doctor was waiting somewhat anxiously with the Torchwood team, resisting the urge to go in and check on her. After a minute, she left the TARDIS and smiled at them all.

It was fake. He knew her well enough to realize that right away.

“Hello,” she said, glancing around at everyone.

“Rosie!” Jack said, swirling her around in a tight hug before setting her down. “You look better already! Not to imply that you ever stopped looking great.” He winked at her and she blushed slightly.

“I’ve missed you, Jack,” she said happily, grabbing his hands in hers. “So much.”

“I’ve missed you too,” he replied, grinning at her.

They left the hub and walked down the street in a group. It felt foreign to the Doctor – going out with a such a huge group of people, most of whom he knew well. However, he didn’t dwell on that thought because his mind was preoccupied with Rose.

She was stealing glances at him, and whenever she did, she saw him watching her intently. He was trying to figure her out in every way that he could. Her body motions, her dialogue, every little detail about her. He was going to get to the bottom of this – there was no doubt in his mind.

When, at lunch, she started coughing quietly into the crook of her elbow, he stiffened immediately, memorizing the sound and the actions and everything in-between. “Rose, you okay?” he asked quietly after it subsided.

She nodded, swallowing. “Yeah, fine. Tiny bit of a cough, I suppose.”

Everyone else seemed to ignore it; they went on chattering and laughing as if nothing had happened. But the Doctor felt void, as if he wasn’t actually in the restaurant and would wake up at any moment back in the TARDIS. There was a strange sense of dread along with it, his every instinct telling him something awful was happening.

When she started coughing during dessert, he couldn’t sit idly any longer. “Rose, can I talk to you?”

Rose stared at him curiously before nodding. “Of course.”

“In private,” he urged.

Everyone else in their booth had grown quiet and was staring at him. He couldn’t bring himself to care. Rose crawled over Jack to get out of her seat and the Doctor led her outside the restaurant, his grip on her bicep firm. As soon as they were outside, she stepped out of his grip.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

He began pacing in short steps back and forth, his trainers clashing against the sidewalk. “You need to tell me what’s going on. And you need to tell me now.”

“Doctor, can we do this later?” She grit her teeth and glanced around nervously. “No need to make a scene while we’re all eating lunch so peacefully, yeah?”

“There is a need,” he said, staring at her. “I can’t take this anymore. Tell me what’s going on with you.”

Rose blinked, and he could see her holding back tears. “I don’t think I can take this anymore, too,” she admitted. “But everyone was having such a nice time, can we please just hold it off a little longer? I promise I’ll tell you. Promise. Just a little longer.”

He groaned in frustration. “Fine. Yes. We’ll wait until after lunch. But you’re going to tell me, and I’m going to run tests. You can’t pretend forever, Rose.” She paled slightly. He grabbed her hands in his and looked down at her seriously. “Listen, whatever is going on with you, I can fix it. I’m brilliant – and I’m not just saying that to boast. Whether it’s a disease or an inflammation or whatever, I can fix it. Can you trust me?”

She swallowed and nodded. “Right. Yeah.”

“Now let’s get back inside,” he mumbled, moving his hand to the small of her back.

How she acted terrified him.

He could see so many traces of himself in her, and he felt a stab of sadness at how similar they had become. She spoke and laughed with a perfect mask – so good that nobody but him noticed how nervous and terrified she truly was. Just how much had she picked up from him over their years travelling together?

~

She tried to prolong the lunch as long as possible.

Rose knew the tests had to be done, they had always had to be done, and she was stupid for thinking that they would be able to ignore it for a longer period of time. But, God, how she wished they could have. Things had been so nice for such a short while. Then the stupid cough had had to come back and ruin everything.

She said polite goodbyes to the others, but the Doctor was having none of it. He announced loudly that he and her were going to go to sleep in the TARDIS, and at Jack’s concerned look she gave the man a small smile, letting him know that everything was fine. Which, of course, was nowhere near the truth.

The Doctor led her silently to the med bay, his face the epitome of fear.

There was so much she had to tell the Doctor, though. This was all wrong. This wasn’t supposed to be how it happened. “Doctor, before we do this, there’s a lot of stuff I’ve got to tell you.”

He turned to face her, his eyes impossibly dark. “I can’t wait, Rose.”

“Please?” she asked. “I need to explain…” She let out a deep breath. “I need to explain what happened.”

“Afterwards,” he promised.

Rose reluctantly allowed him to adjust her body for the special x-ray scanner, which she had seen him use before. He had done it when she had gotten sick several times before, and she knew it provided him with all sorts of information about her without it having too much of a toll on her health.

She spread her arms out when he lifted them gently and turned around when he placed his hands on her shoulders and nodded for her to rotate.

Click. Front view.  
Click. Back view.  
Click. Right side view.  
Click. Left side view.

That was all he needed. He put the machine away and stepped over to the largest monitor in the room to examine them. She could see how nervous he was – she could see it by the way he was constantly moving his hands, whether running them through his hair or wiping them off on his trousers.

When he pulled up the first x-ray on the screen, the front view, he didn’t move at all. She could only see the back of his head from where she was sitting, but she could see most of the x-ray, and it didn’t look too good.

After a long moment she heard him breathe deeply. His hand moved and he opened the next image. Then the next. Then the next.

It felt as if time had gone still – she wasn’t sure whether he was in shock or angry or something else entirely. After a while, he stood up and faced her. His eyes were shut and his head was lowered slightly, as if he was trying to contain himself. “Rose, why didn’t you tell me?”

She thought she had girded herself for this moment extremely well, but her heart – or should she say hearts – shattered in her chest anyways. “I can explain. You’ve just got to let me talk.”

This was what she had been scared of. He would react without letting her explain a single thing – her reason for not telling him. He didn’t understand anything; he had to let her talk. He had to.

“You’re dying,” he said, and she could see the heartbreak in his eyes. “And you didn’t tell me?”

Tears stung at her eyes. “Doctor, I can explain.”

“Explain this?” he jerked his head towards the computer. “I’d love to hear it. You just thought that you could keep travelling with me and not let me know that you’re dying? That it was that easy to manipulate me? To deceive me?”

She shook her head desperately. “Doctor, let me talk.”

“Why should I?” he demanded, turning away from her and pacing the room. “You never talked before, but now that I’m upset you want to? What do you take me for, Rose?”

“Doctor,” she pleaded, each one of his words like a knife stabbing and twisting painfully into her heart.

In a sudden rage, his hands flew across the surface of the desk and medical equipment clattered to the ground loudly. His breathing was erratic and he ran a hand through his hair, desperate to calm down. “I can fix her,” he mumbled in a voice so quiet she almost didn’t hear it. His face changed expressions as though he had suddenly had an epiphany. She saw him mouth those words again, silently this time.

Rose nibbled at her lower lip, wanting to say a thousand things but not quite daring to as he jogged back over to the computer and looked at each x-ray in more detail.

He approached her, his entire demeanor having changed. Anger was still lingering in his eyes, but it was masked by desperation, now. “I need you to tell me exactly what happened. Medically, physically, what happened to you.”

There was no point in lying to him now. There had been enough lying. “You can’t fix it, Doctor. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Pain flickered in his eyes but it was gone quickly and replaced by an energized desperation she had come to know quite well in her travels with him. “You don’t know what I can and can’t do. Now tell me what happened to you.”

“I met a man named Rassilon,” she said quietly. His eyes widened at the name and she elaborated. “I was using this… This dimension cannon. Trying to get back to you. And one time I ended up in this other universe… This universe where…” She shook her head, running a trembling hand through her hair. “Your people were alive. Not all of them, but there were survivors.”

Rose looked up at him experimentally and saw his hardened expression.

She kept going. “They were there, and they took me prisoner. I don’t know why. I thought it wasn’t a big deal ‘cause the Torchwood team would teleport me back to Pete’s World in a few days if I didn’t get back on my own, yeah? But then all of them started talkin’ about how I had something inside me, part of the time vortex.”

“Bad wolf,” he breathed quietly.

Rose nodded. “Yeah. So they started experimenting. Nothing painful, not really, I was unconscious for most of it, but I ended up like this. And when I got pulled back into my dimension…”

“You were sick,” he concluded.

She nodded once again. “I was sick. And had two hearts. And I went to every doctor, ones all over the world. We kept it quiet, of course, but rumors spread anyways. I was in newspaper headliners – everyone wanted to know what was wrong with the Vitex heiress. None of the doctors knew what was wrong. But this one doctor in Torchwood, after I told him my story, he had an explanation.”

“Only Rassilon can fix it,” the Doctor concluded, interrupting her. “Because the disease is foreign to all other universes, nothing from another universe can fix it. The particles of it aren’t recognized by any machinery, any medicine.”

Rose nodded, watching as the words sunk in. “I kept working on the cannon and eventually made it here. I knew… I know there’s nothing you can do.”

“I can fix it,” he said, standing up taller with some sort of new sense of determination. “I’ll figure something out, Rose. A way to fix it.”

She knew it was hopeless. She had already somewhat accepted her fate, as much as one could, anyways. There wasn’t the slightest chance of recovery, and that was the main reason she hadn’t told him. There was absolutely nothing to be done. “Doctor…”

He shot her a look; a warning to not contradict him and tell him that couldn’t do it. “Where’s your sense of optimism?” he asked, giving her a small, sad smile. “I can fix it. Of course I can fix it.”

Rose took a deep breath in and then a deep breath out, trying to convince herself that this wasn’t a dream. He was bent over the screen, fingers moving across the keyboard at an impossible speed. The light of the monitor was reflected on his face and he wore an emotionless expression.

“How was Rassilon in that universe?” he asked suddenly.

She was surprised at his question, and his eyes were still trained on the computer. “I don’t know,” she admitted.

“There’s only one Gallifrey,” he explained, “only one of my planet across all the universes.”

“The planet wasn’t there,” Rose said quietly, “just a few survivors.”

He didn’t respond. The only sound in the room was his fingers flying across the keys.

“You were there. In that universe.”

The Doctor glanced at her briefly before averting his eyes back to the screen. She could tell he was trying to appear uninterested.

She swallowed thickly. “I didn’t see you, but they mentioned you. A lot.”

His eyes fell shut and he turned to face her. “Rose, why don’t you get some sleep?”

She opened her mouth to argue but quickly shut it. “In here?”

He nodded tightly. “I might need to run a few more tests. I’ll wake you if I need anything.”

Rose rested her head on the pillow and pulled a thin white blanket over top of her. She was still cold, but she didn’t mention it. She rolled onto her side to face him, watching as he worked.

The Doctor glimpsed at her, seemingly realizing that she wasn’t going to get any sleep. After a few minutes, he stepped over to another computer and stared at it for a while, eyes flitting about the screen. It took her a minute to realize he was probably staring at the x-ray.

He ran a hand through his hair and stood up, walking over to the other side of the room to search through cabinets. “I’m going to need a blood sample and a tissue sample.”

Rose nodded slowly. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

She shrugged innocently, though he couldn’t see her.

He made a frustrated sound as if he was going to say more but couldn’t form the words to do so. He began plucking things out of cabinets, mostly items Rose recognized but there were some she didn’t – she assumed they were alien. He set them on a silver table with wheels and brought it over to the bed.

He drew blood and she barely felt the sting. He took a tissue sample from her finger then swabbed her throat. “Thanks,” he mumbled quietly as he placed all three samples on the counter. “I’ll study these. Get some sleep.”

She furrowed her eyebrows in concern as he drew curtains across the middle of medical bay, separating them. She listened to the sounds that he made on the other side, her inability to see him surprisingly agitating. Rose rested both of her hands on her stomach and willed her mind to focus on anything else apart from the problem on hand so that she could fall asleep.

~

He couldn’t focus on anything.

His mind was racing at a million miles an hour – thinking of everything and nothing simultaneously. “Damn it,” he muttered, crumpling a piece of paper covered with ideas and tossing it into a trashcan. “Damn it, damn it, damn it…”

It had only been an hour or so, but he was already reeling with anxiety. He ran a hand through his hair roughly and groaned, leaning back in his chair. She had two years to live, it seemed. No regenerations, Rassilon hadn’t granted her those, or she had had them and he had taken them away, the Doctor wasn’t sure, and two years to live.

He should have checked her earlier.

He should have checked her earlier.

The Doctor could practically feel himself falling apart – he had been ever since he had seen that x-ray. Anger, frustration, and mainly inundating betrayal were causing him irrevocable pain.

“Doctor?” Rose called quietly from behind the curtain.

He cursed again mentally. He could hardly stand the sound of her voice right now – especially when it sounded all concerned and sad. “What?”

“I’m kind of thirsty.”

The Doctor leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling. “Right.”

Her voice was barely a whisper and he could hear it trembling. “I could just go to the galley and…”

“I’m not leaving you alone,” he stated firmly. “I’ll get you a cup from right here.”

He grabbed a random cup from a cabinet and got some water from the sink before ducking through the curtain and handing it to her. Her eyes were red and puffy and her body was somewhat paler than normal. “Thanks,” she said, smiling at him.

“Of course.”

Rose worried her bottom lip, taking a long sip of the water before looking up at him in surprise, as if expecting him to have left. “Can we talk?”

He wanted to talk to her, of course he did, but he didn’t trust himself. “I don’t think that’d be best, Rose.”

“I’m sorry, Doctor, I really am,” she said quietly. “If you’d just let me explain…”

“I should get back to work,” he responded, nodding towards the curtain. He swallowed past a lump in his throat, trying to control his body’s reaction to her.

She was shaking, now, and he couldn’t stand the sight of her. All he wanted was to wrap his arms around her and convince them both that everything would be okay. No - what he really wanted was to kiss her - but there were so many reasons why that would never happen and those reasons had only multiplied exponentially in this situation.

“I’ll listen,” he said after a moment, regretting the words a second after they left his mouth. “I’ll give you ten minutes, then I’ll get back to work.”


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A good bit of plot in this chapter. Rose's condition is explained more fully and some hope is given. Hope you guys enjoy!!!

“I don’t know where to start,” Rose stated, wiping off her sweaty hands on her jeans and looking at him.

He was sitting on the bedside staring at her with such a sad look that she figured he must have been mentally planning her funeral. “At the beginning?” he suggested.

Her eyes fell shut. “Right. I guess in Canary Wharf. I, um, fell… You saw that.”

Pain flashed across his face. He nodded tightly, as if paralyzed from the shoulders down.

“And then you came and I went to the beach. And after that I just knew I had to get back to you. So I started this Torchwood project… The Dimension Cannon, I called it. To get back. Here, I mean. To this universe.”

“That was risky, Rose,” he stated.

“Wasn’t it worth it, though?” she asked quietly, shaking her head, prepared to disagree.

“Look what it did to you,” he said, nodding towards the monitors. “Do you think it was worth all those years of your life? All that potential?”

Rose bit her lip, not a single doubt in her mind. “It was worth it, since I got to see you again.”

He didn’t say anything to that, he just ducked his head and she figured she should continue with her story and not dwell on this topic.

“I started working on the cannon. Worked on it with some people you don’t know along with people you do. We started making progress. It was ready for the first jump, so of course it had to be me.”

“Why did it have to be you?” he interrupted, looking upset.

She continued, not answering his question. She wasn’t going to get into the topic of obligation with him. “The first jump was okay. It wasn’t this universe, so I jumped back and it was fine. Got some rest – it was really tiring, for some reason – went back out the next day. I kept jumping and jumping…”

“What did you see?” he asked.

She opened her mouth to ask how he had known that she was skirting around things, but then closed it. “Some bad stuff,” she admitted. “Some good stuff. I saw… It’s not important.” Rose paused. “Not relevant.”

“Of course it’s relevant,” he urged, scooting closer to her. “Everything is relevant. A tiny detail could change everything. What bad stuff?”

Flashes of death and war flashed through her mind but she mentally shook them off. “Doctor, it doesn’t matter. You can’t just wave your sonic screwdriver and fix my memories, you know.” She gave him a sad smile and he resigned, keeping his gaze trained on her. “Anyways, eventually I made a jump to this one universe. I was in some building, so I started looking around. Some regular Earth building, kind of pristine. Very orange and red and silver.”

He knew where this was going, she could tell by the way his stare intensified and his eyebrows drew together in concentration and confusion.

“And there was some random guard, he took me to a cell. I didn’t question it much, it seemed cozy enough compared to the cells I’d been in before with you, and I knew I’d be teleported back to Pete’s World in a few days. So no big deal.”

“But then one of them took me out of my cell,” Rose continued, averting her eyes to the floor. “And they just used some scanners on me and kept saying there was something inside me. Part of the vortex. I knew right away they had to be talking about Bad Wolf. So they started experimenting.”

Rose looked up at him, gauging his reaction. His jaw was set in a firm line and he looked as if he was about to throw something. She couldn’t tell whether or not he was shaking slightly, but she continued nevertheless. “This man named Rassilon, he kept coming into the room they were keeping me in. He started giving me some weird drug; I never learned the name of it. It was pinkish, made me fall asleep really fast.”

The Doctor’s eyes darkened and she could tell he was thinking of a thousand and one ways to painfully rip Rassilon limb from limb. Perhaps they hadn’t had the best history in this universe.

“I was scared when I woke up with two hearts. He kept saying something had gone wrong, he wouldn’t tell me what. I think I was on some other kind of drug – made me all loopy. Anyways, I got teleported back to Pete’s World by Mickey a little bit later and I was sick.”

He swallowed, nodding slightly. “Then what?”

“Just like I told you. Started going to a bunch of doctors, nobody could figure it out. Eventually jumped here. Have you…” Rose gave him a hopeful look. “Have you figured anything out?”

Guilt overwhelmed his features and he held his breath. She knew she probably shouldn’t have asked that question. “No, I haven’t,” he admitted, his voice distant.

“Do you want to…” Rose sighed. This was so difficult. But she knew if he kept bottling up his feelings like this there would be an explosion. She had seen it before. “Do you want to talk about it?”

He laughed shakily. “Nothing to say.” He glanced up at the clock, though she knew he had his time sense anyways. “It’s been over ten minutes. I should get back to work.”

Rose didn’t argue, she simply nodded. “Should we tell the others?”

“They’re probably still sleeping,” he pointed out. “We’ll tell them in the morning.”

“Right.”

~

When Rose woke up, it was to a strange, obnoxiously loud buzzing noise. Her eyes flew open as she processed some sort of a machine covering her mouth and nose. She reached up one hand to touch the machine when something darted out and grabbed her wrist.

“I need you to keep that on for another couple minutes,” the Doctor said, releasing her arm. “Just testing to see if humidity will affect this cough at all.”

Rose frowned. “I didn’t wake up when you put this on me?”

He smiled slightly and she felt warmth spread throughout her at the sincere nature of it. “You wouldn’t wake up if an elephant stampede came through here.”

Rose whacked him on the arm playfully and laughed into the machine. “It feels kinda weird,” she pointed out.

The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, sorry. I’ll just take it off in a few minutes and check your readings. It doesn’t hurt, does it?”

She shook her head. It didn’t – it just tingled.

“Good,” he replied. “I ran a lot of readings last night – I think I have a grasp on the problem.”

Rose’s eyebrows shot up. “Really?” She had to admit, she was impressed. Several of the smartest doctors in Pete’s World had taken ages to figure this out. Then again, she thought as she looked at his determined expression, he was the Doctor.

He yanked around a monitor to face her and pointed towards the screen, not dissimilar to a teacher about to give a lecture. “When Ras… When the Time Lords found you, Bad Wolf, or the time vortex, wasn’t a problem. It was simply lingering in your cells, might have added a couple of days onto your life, that’s about it.”

“But, of course, they were curious, so they started prodding with it. Expanding it. Probably trying to make you into some sort of power source or something, I’m not sure. Did you catch anything that they said?”

She shook her head sadly. “Nothing to do with me. They just talked about other stuff.”

He looked interested, but then shook his head as if getting himself back on topic. “Anyways, they were prodding at the time vortex particles lingering within you and managed to expand upon them so that they were throughout your entire body. Thus making you a bit of an anomaly – you still are, really. Make sense so far?”

The Doctor was talking at a million miles an hour, but she managed to keep up. She nodded.

“Eventually, the particles were so far spread throughout your body that a species alteration began to occur. I would assume that, similar to what happened on the Game Station, your body couldn’t withstand the mass of particles so they sped up the process by giving you a single regeneration.”

“Which is why I was in the coma?” she asked, somewhat confused.

He nodded. “Basically, in layman’s terms, they made you a Time Lady to save your life, probably for nefarious purposes. Anyways! Here’s where the problem comes in: the time vortex particles that you obtained from Bad Wolf were from this universe, correct?”

Rose licked her lips, unsure of where this was going.

“The particles that the Time Lords inserted into you were from that universe, that alternate universe. There’s a different time vortex for every universe, correct? Picture it a bit like two types of yogurts. Say you have strawberry yogurt and banana yogurt, yes?”

“Banana yogurt?” Rose asked, raising an eyebrow.

He made a hand gesture. “Just picture the two yogurts. Any flavors you fancy. Say you take the banana yogurt and mix it in with the strawberry to make strawberry-banana yogurt. That strawberry-banana yogurt is your cough. Then, say, you try and put that strawberry-banana yogurt back into the strawberry yogurt container.”

“It’d be wrong,” she pointed out.

He nodded sadly. “It wouldn’t work.”

“So I’m a strawberry yogurt container?” Rose asked, smiling.

“Exactly! Which is the issue. All we need to do is separate the banana from the strawberry and get rid of it and BOOM!” He shouted suddenly and she backed up instinctively. “Perfect yogurt! The doctor who explained the problem to you in Pete’s World was just a tiny bit off. Those Time Lords and Ladies from the other dimension definitely could fix the problem as well.”

Rose smiled, beginning to feel hopeful. If he had accomplished all that in only one night, maybe there was a cure to be found. “So you know how to separate the strawberry and the banana?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, not exactly… But I’m working on that!”

Rose pointed to the machine on her mouth. “Can I remove this now?”

The Doctor pulled it off of her mouth and set it on a tray. “Yep. Molto bene. You snore, by the way. You have no idea how loud that machine got when you started snoring.”

She laughed as he sprinted over to a monitor and began analyzing something. Rose wondered what had happened to him – he had been so lugubrious last night and now… Now he was back to his old self. Concerned and scared, of course, but himself.

Rose sniffed the air, frowning and coughing a little, trying to cover it up with a yawn so he wouldn’t notice. “Did you make bacon?”

He swirled around on his heels, walking up to her. “Do you smell bacon?”

She nodded. “Yeah. And scrambled eggs, I think. And… Mmm, pancakes.”

“It’s the sense of smell,” he explained. “They’re probably making that in Torchwood.”

“Let’s go eat?” she suggested. “We can tell the others about it during breakfast.

His face dropped.

The last thing she wanted was him to revert back to that desperate, broken form of himself he had been mere hours ago. She backtracked. “We can tell them later, maybe. But I’m still starving.”

He nodded. “Right. Breakfast for the Time Lady,” he said, giving her a cheeky grin.

Rose quirked an eyebrow. “Thought I was an anomaly?”

“Nah,” he said, shrugging. “Well, technically, I suppose, you’d be a Gallifreyan, but there’s not really an academy anymore, so I guess I’ll let you slide.” The Doctor winked.

“You could be my professor,” she teased, grabbing his hand in hers.

“Not a bad idea. Want to learn about Quantum Physics and look into the Un-tempered Schism until you go mad?”

She didn’t even know what that was, but she shook her head. “You’re right. Maybe you should just pass me automatically.”

He simply frowned at her on the bed. “Do you want a wheelchair? Or me to carry you?”

Rose rolled her eyes. “Nah. Gotta test out this supreme biology you’re always going on about.”

The Doctor gave her a look before shrugging and tugging her off of the bed and out of the room. Rose followed right behind him, relishing in the new feelings that were overwhelming her. The smell of breakfast was like music to her ears – er - nose, and even the air against her face and flowing through her air felt relaxing.

“Everything feel good?” he asked, seemingly reading her mind.

Rose nodded. “Yeah, it does. Great, actually. You feel like this all the time?”

He nodded. “You’ll get more used to it. It won’t be so overwhelming later – you’ll hardly notice it.”

~

“You two are up late,” Jack pointed out, giving Rose a suggestive smile that she was glad the Doctor didn’t see.

“Rose sleeps for an impossibly long time, even as a Time Lady,” the Doctor complained, piling up pancakes on his plate. “Who cooked?”

Martha raised a hand from the table. “I did.”

“It looks delicious,” Rose said, smiling at her and sitting down. She noticed the way the Doctor was ghosting her, never moving more than ten feet from her side.

“So when are you going to get travelling again?” Jack asked, plopping down beside Rose at the head of the table and sipping tea. “The Doctor sitting still for several days in a row – pigs must be flying across the grand canyon and singing ‘The Time of My Life’.”

Rose laughed, taking a stab at her pancake. “If I didn’t know any better I would say he’s finally becoming domesticated.”

“Oi!” the Doctor retorted, nudging her shoulder with his own.

She scooted her chair closer to his. He immediately grabbed her left hand in his right, forcing him to use his left hand to hold his fork, and she smiled, remembering that he was ambidextrous.

Donna sat down at the head of the table opposite Jack and smiled. “Morning.”

Everyone greeted her before Jack brought them back on topic. “Anyways, when are you going to travel again? Seems like Rosie is all better.”

Rose felt the Doctor stiffen beside her and she scooted slightly closer to him so that their shoulders were touching, giving his hand a tight squeeze. She ran her thumb up and down his skin in an attempt to sooth him. It seemed to work slightly, as she felt some tension leave his muscles. “Soon, I think,” she explained to Jack. “He wants to make sure I’m a hundred percent okay first.”

Martha nodded. “Good. You shouldn’t be going anywhere with your condition not totally deciphered. And that’s coming from a doctor.”

Rose smiled in agreement. “Definitely.”

Donna looked from Rose to the Doctor. “Could I come with for a few trips? I’ve been thinking about it and, if I won’t be too much of an intrusion, I’d love to come.”

Rose smiled brightly. “That’d be great!” She kicked the Doctor’s foot to get him to speak.

“Of course,” he said, nodding at Donna. “The more the merrier.” After a moment, to Rose’s surprise, he spoke again. “In fact, I thought we’d start with the past.” He turned to Rose, squeezing her hand. “1851?”

She poked her tongue out of her teeth as she smiled. “Where in?”

“Victorian London!” he announced happily.

“That’d be brilliant,” she mused. 

He thought for a moment. “Maybe on Christmas Eve? That’d be fun, eh?”

Donna smiled. “Sounds great.”

“It’s a plan,” the Doctor announced. Rose leaned her head on his shoulder and he moved his arm around her waist.

Rose saw Martha and Donna exchanging strange looks and wondered what that was about. Deciding not to focus on it for now, she began planning their trip to 1851 with the Doctor and they got trapped in their own little world together, imagining and laughing.

Just like the old times, Rose thought happily as she stared up at him.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor and Rose decide upon when they're going to start travelling and Rose gets some invaluable advice from Martha.

“Were you serious at breakfast?” Rose asked the Doctor when they were alone, walking into the TARDIS. “About us travelling soon? With Donna?”

He smiled sincerely. “Of course I was.”

“What about the yogurt?” she asked, frowning. “You know, strawberry and banana – the separation?”

“We’ll do that and then travel,” he elaborated, walking down the hallway with his hands shoved in his pockets.

Rose caught up with him and tried to get a good look at his face. “You make it sound like it’s gonna be really easy. Is it?”

“It should be,” the Doctor replied nonchalantly. Just a few more tests and I’ll have it figured it out, Rose. I’ll need you in the medical bay again tonight – I’m going to put you on some drugs and monitor the effects. It’s no good for you to be walking around without any sort of medication.”

She swallowed. “Will I be, you know, loopy?”

The Doctor shook his head. “Not those sorts of drugs. Well…” He rubbed the back of his neck. “A few of them might be. But I can give you those ones while you’re asleep, if you’d rather.”

Rose tried to imagine herself drugged up while conscious around the Doctor and shuddered. “Yeah, while I’m asleep might be best.”

“I promise I’ll get to the bottom of this, Rose.” The Doctor smiled at her and kissed the top of her head.

Rose smiled up at him and grabbed his hand, squeezing it gently. “I know you will.”

They entered the library without really thinking about it – after all, it was where they went before Canary Wharf whenever they were simply relaxing. Rose sat down on the sofa and watched as the Doctor carefully searched the tall, cherry-wood shelves. Occasionally he plucked a book from them, stared at the cover, and then placed it back into its position.

Rose watched him in amusement, enjoying the view of his bum and back muscles that moved underneath his tight suit. She thought he looked skinnier than when they had travelled together – or perhaps it was just her imagination.

“What are you looking for?” she asked eventually. She had her chin propped up on her palm and was lying on her stomach, elbow resting on the arm of the sofa.

He glanced at her over his shoulder; glasses perched on the tip of his nose, looking irrevocably adorable, in her biased opinion. “Oh, nothing. Just a book.”

She thought about telling him that the fact that he was looking for a book was a bit obvious, but she thought better of it and continued her ogling instead. Well, perhaps ogling wasn’t the best word – that made it sound a bit too dirty. More like… Admiration.

After a few more minutes he seemingly found what he was looking for, plucking the book off of a shelf and grinning to himself. He walked back over to her and Rose pretended as if she hadn’t been admiring him by picking up a random book off of the coffee table and pretending to study the first page.

“What are you reading?” he asked her, plopping down beside her and sinking into the cushions.

“Dunno, just picked it up. Looked interesting,” she lied.

The Doctor quirked an eyebrow, leaning forward to see the cover. “The development of biotechnological enhancements on Deruol XII looked interesting?”

Rose shrugged. “What are you reading?” She looked at the green cover but he quickly turned it away from her.

“A book about anomalies,” he admitted. “Written by my people, happened to have a copy in here.”

She frowned. “To help with my, uh, condition?”

The Doctor nodded, flipping open the book and scanning the first page.

Rose bit her lower lip. She was torn between thanking him for worrying about her and telling him that he should read something he actually wanted to read instead of about her medical issue. In the end, she decided not to pester him further and to get a book for herself instead to distract her mind.

She picked a good-looking cover from the fiction section and read the synopsis on the back, deciding that it seemed like her type. Rose allowed herself to become immersed in the book – it was a love story about a traveller from another planet who met a girl on one of his travels and how they fell in love. Some parts of it – especially the differences between the two lovers – hit a bit close to home, but it was a good read all the same.

After a few hours she doggy-eared the page of the book she was on and set it down on the table. “I’m going to go into Torchwood,” she announced to the Doctor, standing up.

Immediately, he was by her side with his book in his hands. “I’ll come,” he suggested.

“You don’t have to,” Rose said, worried that he felt the need to accompany her when, really, she was perfectly capable of going to Torchwood on her own. Besides, it wasn’t as if she was going to be alone and without care. “I mean, if you want to, sure, but you don’t have to.”

He smiled at her a little shyly. “I’d like to come with you.”

Rose gave him a smile in return, looping her arm with his and walking him out of the library and down the hall. “I can’t wait for us to start travelling,” she beamed, leaning closer to him. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed it.”

“How long were you in Pete’s World?” the Doctor asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“Five years. Well, four years and ten months.” In a quieter voice, she added, “And nineteen days.”

He nodded, taking in the information. Five entire years. Blimey, that had been longer than he had fathomed. “We can start travelling soon,” he promised.

“How soon?” Rose asked eagerly.

“As soon as you’re better,” he promised. “Completely and one-hundred percent better.”

She sighed, leaning closer to him. “What if we don’t go anywhere life-threatening? A small trip couldn’t hurt me, yeah? Victorian London in… What year did you suggest?”

“1851,” he provided.

“Maybe tomorrow?” she prompted, squeezing his hand. “Or the day after? Come on, I’m dying to get out of here,” Rose pleaded, leaning closer to him and resting her chin on his shoulder. They were in the console room, though he couldn’t remember when they had stopped walking.

He felt ambivalent, torn between wanting to please Rose and wanting to keep her safe in the TARDIS until he was sure that she couldn’t ever be harmed or taken from him again. When he looked at her, his mental conflict only increased.

He saw a bit of himself in her – there was that same wanderlust and desperation to travel anywhere and everywhere. He tried to switch their positions – imagine himself stranded for so long. Then, he realized that it wasn’t hard, since he had been stranded here for a relatively long while. He wanted to travel, too. He hadn’t quite realized just how badly until this moment.

After a while, she had broken his, admittedly, initially weak resolve. “Alright. Tomorrow. But, promise me that if you don’t feel good we won’t go. Agreed?”

Rose nodded, giving him a brief kiss on the cheek, at which he was embarrassed by how his hearts raced wildly and he felt his face reddening. “I will.”

They stepped out into Torchwood and sat down with the others in the common area where they were watching some sports game that he couldn’t bring himself to care about. Instead, he only had eyes for Rose.

“You two have been spending a lot of time alone lately,” Jack said suggestively, waggling his eyebrows. Martha hit him on the arm. “I’m just messing with them!” he defended.

Rose ducked her head slightly. “We’re not like that, Jack.”

Donna rolled her eyes. “Yeah right. Thick as thieves, you two are.”

The Doctor gaped at Donna in shock. “What exactly do you mean by that?”

“Longing looks, whispering nonsense to one another, giggling,” Donna said, counting off on her fingers. Jack hummed in agreement.

“You two are teaming up on us now, huh?” Rose asked, looking between Donna and Jack. She hadn’t gotten to know Donna particularly well yet, but she now realized she was the straightforward type.

Changing the topic, the Doctor nodded towards the TARDIS. “By the way, we’re leaving tomorrow for a trip. You still want to come, Donna?”

Donna nodded. Then, Martha spoke up. “Could I come too, you think? Just for a trip or two, I kind of miss it, honestly.”

The Doctor brightened. “Of course! That’d be brilliant. The quartet of… Uh…”

“Quirkiness?” Rose suggested.

He laughed and moved closer to her. “Do I seem quirky to you?”

She gave him a playful smile. “Quizzical, maybe.”

“Oi!”

“Or… Hmm… Quaint, quick-witted, quixotic?”

The Doctor looked at her, his expression full of pride. “You have a great vocabulary! Wait – do you know what quixotic means?”

Rose simply gave him a mischievous look. “I do know what it means.”

He smacked her on the arm teasingly and she hit him back. She leaned in close to his ear and whispered a lame joke about the word at which he giggled and wrapped an arm around her waist, tugging her closer to him.

Rose, admittedly, had practically forgotten there were other people in the room. When she looked up at the amused faces of their friends, she gave an embarrassed nod to them and decided to quiet up, realizing how they had essentially just proven Donna right.

“Not thick as thieves, yeah right. If they’re not sleeping together, then I’m the prime minister.” Donna mumbled to Jack, causing him to burst out in laughter.

“What did you say?” the Doctor asked, looking anxiously from Donna to Jack. “What was it?” he repeated.

~

A few hours later, Martha offered to go and get food for the lot of them. Rose offered to go with her, and the Doctor stared after her apprehensively, not dissimilar to a lost puppy. Rose told him that she’d be fine and the chippy shop wasn’t far, and eventually he acquiesced.

At the beginning of the walk there was a companionable silence between the two women, until Rose asked her a question. “So how long did you travel with the Doctor?”

“I’m not sure how long it was,” Martha admitted. “Sometimes it feels so short, sometimes it feels so long, you know?” Rose nodded understandingly “Definitely around one year. Give or take a few months. How about you?”

“I don’t know either. A long time, maybe two years? I’ve got no idea. Probably a little bit over that.”

Martha hummed. “He loves you, you know.”

Rose looked at her, surprised. “What?”

“I’ve never seen him as happy as when he’s with you,” the other woman elaborated, an emotion that Rose couldn’t detect underlying in her inflection. “Never seen him smile so much, laugh so much. And the looks he gives you when he thinks you’re not looking… I wish I had a relationship like that.”

Rose thought about her current medical condition and his reaction to it, and more importantly the strain that was still on their relationship because of it – the strain that both of them had covered up so efficiently. She swallowed, remembering how angry he had been. “But we’re not like that. We’re just friends, really.”

“Do you want more?” Martha asked. “I know Donna and Jack have been joking about it, but what do you actually want? And do you know what he wants?”

Rose thought about it. More with the Doctor. For so long it had seemed like such an unattainable dream – such as how someone would dream about becoming a billionaire or how a child dreamed about becoming a superhero.

But now it was so much closer, so barely out of reach if they could just get past a few barriers. For one, there was her condition, which was an inevitable obstacle. And then there were his undeniable emotional issues. She wasn’t sure which would be harder to overcome.

“I’d love it, having more with him,” she admitted. “But don’t tell him I said that,” she added. “I don’t want to scare him away, I guess.”

Martha gave her a sympathetic smile. “I had a crush on him, you know.”

“Really?”

“Mhmm. At first, I kind of kept dropping little hints. When it became clear he was totally oblivious – he’s a bit human in that respect, isn’t he? – I got a little more straightforward, but eventually it hit me. He’s besotted with you. Talked about you all the time. Seemed as though everything reminded him of you.”

Rose frowned at the other woman, reaching out to squeeze her arm comfortingly. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Martha assured her. “I’m over it. I thought to myself, I can get out there and find myself someone better for me. He’s my friend – he’ll always be my friend, he’s amazing, really, but it wasn’t meant to be between us at all. All I could wish after I had left him was that he’d find you again. And, well, you found him.”

Rose smiled and felt tears threatening to form in the corners of her eyes. She swallowed and composed herself, somewhat humiliated by how easily Martha’s words had affected her. “You’ll find someone who deserves you,” Rose said after a moment. “Someone who loves you unconditionally.”

Martha sighed. “Yeah, one day, maybe. But my point is, he loves you. And I’d bet quite a lot that he wants more with you, too, even if he’s a bit stupid about it.”

“He is really human in that aspect,” Rose concurred.

Martha nodded, annoyance evident in her expression. “Really human.”

They laughed and Rose held open the door to the chippy shop for Martha. “We’re trying to keep it a little on the down-low, but I have a small medical condition that came with the whole, um, species change,” Rose said. “The Doctor says he can fix it really soon, but that’s why he’s been a little… Uh, stressed.”

Martha frowned. “What kind of a condition?”

“It’s… It’s like a cough. It comes and goes like crazy, though. Sometimes it’s barely there, sometimes it’s really bad. Something to do with different particles from different universes, I don’t know. He’s worried about it, though. Hardly leaves my side. Is it bad that that doesn’t really bother me? The clinginess, I mean.”

Martha shrugged. “It might start to bother you eventually. If it ever does, just tell him. Or maybe he’ll just stop being so clingy as soon as you’re better. Who knows with him, really?”

Rose laughed. “He’s so unpredictable. I honestly don’t know how to initiate more with him. He won’t take any hints – or if he did he’d probably just brush them off.”

Martha ordered the food quickly then sat down on a stool. “I think you sort of just have to rip off the bandage with him.”

Rose sat next to her. “What do you mean?”

“Make it one day, when everything is fixed with your cough, of course, just out of the blue. I don’t think there’s another way to do it. If you wait for the perfect situation then it’ll never come – not with his lifestyle.”

She thought about it. “Yeah, you’re right. I think it has to be out of the blue.”

Martha gave her a reassuring smile. “You shouldn’t be nervous. Nothing could scare him off, Rose. He’s in love with you.”

Somehow hearing the words physically being spoken by someone else shocked Rose slightly. Did Martha really believe that? Was it even true? What if she was wrong and Rose ended up making a complete fool of herself? She grimaced as she imagined the Doctor rejecting her, completely shocked by her actions. That was, she reminded herself, worst-case scenario.

“When you do it,” Martha said, “you’ve gotta be a hundred percent sure, Rose. Because he won’t be sure at first, so it’ll help reassure him if you’re confident.”

“Thanks for the advice,” Rose told her, genuinely grateful. When she had travelled with the Doctor before, it was rare that she got any relationship advice. There was Jack, of course, but his relationship advice usually consisted of shagging the Doctor senseless against the nearest surface and allowing Jack to watch and possibly join in.

“Anytime you need advice, I’m available,” Martha promised her, smiling.

Their food was ready and Rose picked up the bags, handing a few to Martha and proceeding to walk out of the shop.

~

The two women walked through the street chattering happily to one another, talking about the Doctor amongst other things. What they didn’t notice, however, was a tall figure stationed at the entry to an alleyway, shrouded by tall, looming shadows. He was dressed in a black jacket with a gun strapped to his side underneath it and some regular, faded blue jeans. Nothing conspicuous.

He picked up his cell phone, hitting the speed-dial button. The other end picked up halfway through the first ring and he pressed the phone to his ear.

“Did you find it?” the voice on the other end asked instantaneously.

“Yes,” the figure replied in a gruff voice. “There’s a woman with it. Dark skin, black hair in a ponytail, purple shirt. Attractive. Human, I’m fairly certain.”

“Track them,” the woman on the other end commanded. “If they split up, consider the anomaly more vital than its accomplice.”

The man nodded. “I’ll follow the anomaly. Should I send you coordinates?”

“Yes. Be careful, but try to integrate yourself into its situation and learn something. Don’t get too close, but get a handle on its defenses and surroundings.”

He nodded again, mentally memorizing each word of his boss. “Why don’t we just grab it now? It’d be easy – I have the spray Dormioxiclyn drug that’s in testing. I could grab the anomaly and bring it to you after knocking the woman out.”

The woman sounded annoyed. “We need more information first. The anomaly could potentially be too dangerous to be kept with the others, or it could be hiding with even more of them. Do as you’re told – you’re not paid to be creative.”

“Right, sorry,” he apologized pathetically.

“Just get to work.”

The line went dead, and the man began following the anomaly and the woman with her at a safe distance, listening in on their conversation as he walked.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is ambivalent about taking Rose on a trip in the TARDIS, but her persistence has worn him down.

Rose’s breathing was the only sound in the medical bay as the Doctor continued to analyze the results of her x-ray, looking for any detail, any pixel that could provide an insight on how to help her. He took off his glasses and scrubbed a hand over his face, looking over at her.

She looked so small as she lay there on her side. Everything about her felt different. He was more aware of her mind, too, now that she was a Time Lady. He’d felt her thoughts brush up against his more than once, but he’d resisted the temptation to look.

“Any luck, Doc?” Jack asked, entering the room and grabbing him on the shoulder.

The Doctor winced. “You scared me. And no, not yet.” His entire body ached, but he knew he had to keep working. He got the most done when she was sleeping, and he was starting to realize that this wouldn’t be an easy problem to solve. Normally he was up to a challenge, but normally the challenge didn’t have such dire consequences.

Jack still didn’t know about any of this. It wasn’t fair.

“Jack, you should know… Rose’s condition is worse than you think.”

The man sat down on his desk, shaking his head. “What do you mean it’s worse than I think? I thought you said she was getting better?”

“She is, in a way, but…”

Rose stirred, rolling onto her back and yawning. Her fingers reached up to try and brush through her tangled hair, but after a moment she appeared to give up. “Morning.”

The Doctor’s voice was thick. “Good morning.”

“Morning, Rosie,” Jack greeted. “Doctor, can I speak with you outside?”

He wasn’t sure how to respond - partially because he didn’t want to leave Rose and partially because he wasn’t sure that her condition was his secret to share. Rose should be the one to tell him, he figured. “That’s alright, Jack,” he said.

Jack didn’t look appeased, but he stood anyways. “We’ll talk later, then?”

“Yeah, we’ll talk later,” the Doctor promised, though there was no weight behind his words. He figured Jack knew that.

Rose sat up, rubbing at her forehead. “Talk about what?”

There was internal conflict he’d been dealing with since he’d found out about her disease - if ‘disease’ was even the right word. Part of him was tempted to run away from the problem, but the other half of him continually reminded its cowardly counterpart that this was Rose Tyler. He couldn’t possibly run away from Rose Tyler.

And yet she was dying in front of him. Rose coughed into her elbow and avoided his eyes, and he wondered if she could see the turmoil behind his eyes. He’d have to hide it as best as he could, for her own sake.

What he’d been doing lately was diving into the work. Instead of pondering how to escape the situation, he faced it head on, searching and testing and scanning and reading everything he could. And yet nothing had worked so far, and though it had only been a few days, it was still discouraging.

“1851 today, yeah?” she asked, offering him a smile.

This time, he couldn’t even force himself to smile. He’d promised her that they’d travel today, but there was nothing he wanted to do less in the world than let her leave this medical bay. He just stared at her blankly, still wondering if she’d disappear at any moment, still wondering if she was real.

Maybe it was all a dream.

Rose cleared her throat. “Doctor?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know if today is best. I’ve got a lot to do.”

She didn’t say anything, just nodded and looked down at her lap, wringing her hands together. She hadn’t even seen the TARDIS yet, he’d realized. Seen her old room, anything like that.

It was exactly the way she’d left it - he hadn’t touched a thing, though he had gone in their a few times. He understood the way she felt, having been away for so long and being cooped up in the Torchwood hub instead of exploring the universe.

“Maybe a short trip,” he offered, regretting the words the moment they left his lips.

Rose looked up at him, hopeful. “Yeah?”

He realized just how much her smile meant to him, just how much he’d go through to see that smile. He’d walk on broken glass. “Yeah.”

“Victorian London,” she mused, resting her hand on his arm. “Think there’ll be danger?”

“With you around? Most likely.”   
Rose laughed and it was both painful and cathartic for him to hear, his mind threatening to collapse in on itself if he kept thinking about her cough, her two hearts, her sickness, his feelings for her. Her hand was still on his arm and he was hyperaware of every inch of contact. Now that she was a Time Lady, he figured maybe she was, too.

“Should we go?” Rose asked, swinging her legs over the side of the bed.

He glanced back at the makeshift desk he’d set up in the corner, at the piles of papers and sticky notes and books. There were drawings, graphs, photos. His body ached with exhaustion, he wondered how long it had been since he’d first come to Torchwood. Days, weeks, centuries?

Rose slipped her hand down his arm and laced their fingers together, squeezing. Still a perfect fit. “Doctor, thank you for trying so hard. But you’ve gotta take a break at some point, yeah? We can’t be stuck in here forever.”

We could, he wanted to point out. You'd be safer, I might be able to find a cure, and then could travel the stars together. We could travel anywhere for as long as we wanted.

“Rose…”

She rolled her eyes and tugged him down to sit beside her. Then she moved closer to him, her thigh pressing against his own. “C’mon, Victorian London. I know you - and I know you can’t resist.”

His mouth was dry as he glanced down at her leg pressed against his own. Perhaps they were both thinking about ‘resist’ in a different context. “Maybe in a few hours? Rose, if I’m being honest, I haven’t had a breakthrough yet about your…” He made a vague hand gesture.

Rose seemed to understand - she had always understood him. It was something he could count on, like Earth’s sun rising in the east. “You’re worrying too much.”

No, he wanted to argue, she was worrying far, far too little. In fact, her calmness about the entire situation shook him. What was she thinking? Did she not realize what was happening to her in this moment, in this second?

Her hand left his - he felt the absence like a bad head cold - and moved up to cup his cheek. “I’ve missed you, you know.”

“I’ve missed you, too,” he admitted without a thought, focused on keeping his eyes open and not letting himself succumb to her touch, to the way it made him feel.

“Do you trust me still?” Rose asked, searching his eyes.

He wasn’t sure. It was an odd mixture of trust and distrust. She’d lied to him about her own condition, and yet if he had to put his own life in anybody’s hands…

“Of course I trust you.”

She brushed her thumb along the line of his jaw. “Then can we go to the TARDIS? I’ve missed her.”

Every last shred of logic in his head told him to say no, to keep researching, to keep searching for a cure. And yet the power of Rose Tyler’s voice seemed to completely overpower any logic, kicking it to the curb. “Okay, let’s go.”

Her eyes lit up. “Really?”

“She has missed you, too.”

~

They said goodbye to the others, except for Donna and Martha, who had wanted to come with them. The Doctor had gathered his notes and shoved them into the TARDIS medical bay before he left, already thinking about what other tests he could perform in order to find results.

Jack gave him a tight hug, clapping him on the back. “Don’t be a stranger, Doc.”

“We’ll come back,” Rose promised before Jack wrapped her in a hug as well.

The Doctor watched as Jack clung to her tightly, his chin resting on top of the head. In the past, the sight may have made him uncomfortable, but now he just feels pity. Jack still didn’t know. And judging by the look in Jack’s eyes, the anomaly still wanted to ask, but for whatever reason he was holding back.

They step into the TARDIS and wave goodbye, shutting the doors. Rose is already heading down the hallway. “I’m gonna go see my old room.”

He comes with her without a word, leaving Donna and Martha in the console room. Rose arrives at her beige door, her fingers drifting over the wood before turning the golden knob and looking around inside.

“It hasn’t changed,” she comments, sounding surprised.

The Doctor leaned against the doorway, watching her. “Did you think I’d rummage through it?”

She doesn’t answer that, just sits down on her pink bedspread and feels the soft covers. “I’ve missed this so much.”

Her voice is small and her eyes move up to meet his, portraying a type of fear that he’s seen before, the kind that he never wants to see again. Before he can think he’s sitting beside her, their knees touching.

Rose looks around. “She feels different. It’s like she’s in my head.”

“She has always been in your head, but now it feels more prominent. It’s because you’re a Time Lady, technically,” he says.

She places her hand on her chest, feeling her two hearts. “Still feels weird.”

He takes her hand in his and moves it to his own chest. “We’re matching, though.”

“We are matching,” Rose confirms, grinning at him now, though there’s still a fragility to her features, as if she’s teetering on the edge between happiness and despair.

He can certainly relate to that feeling. She laces their fingers, her thumb brushing against his. It’s an all too familiar action and he wonders about her. Wonders about everything. “Rose, you’ve hardly told me anything about Pete’s World,” he points out.

Rose smiles. “I’ve got a little brother, now. Tony Tyler.”

“Tony Tyler,” he repeats. “What’s he like?”

“He’s brilliant. Energetic and talkative and always running all over the place… Reminds me of you, actually.”

The Doctor isn’t sure what to say to that - he remembers that she probably won’t see Tony again. Everything feels different with her, he wishes things could just go back to the way things had been, smoother, easier. But now she’s sick and he’s stressed out of his mind and Donna and Martha are still waiting in the console room for them, probably wondering what’s happening by now…

“Doctor.” 

He searches her eyes for answers, but they offer none.

Her hand is still on top of his and she squeezes his fingers, trying to get his attention. “Are you alright?”

He’s really not. No, scratch that, he’s absolutely not, because she’s dying and yet here they are, about to go travel around Victorian London because she’s acting like everything’s fine and he doesn’t know what is going through that head of hers. What he would give to just read her thoughts, to figure out how best to help her, how best to make her happy. All he has ever wanted was her happiness.

“I’m always alright,” he answers.

Then she cups his cheek again, and it takes all of his willpower not to shut his eyes, not to lean into her touch and let her comfort him in the way that only she knew how. “We both know that’s not true.”

Instead, he shifts away from her touch, his heart breaking as the light leaves her eyes, as she brings her hand back down to her lap. “I just don’t know about…” He makes a gesture for the room, the TARDIS, the situation, everything, “this.”

Rose lets out a sigh, falling backwards on the bed so that she’s facing the ceiling, her legs stretched out. His mind is taken back to lazy Sunday mornings, him dragging her out of bed for a day of movies, a day of console repairs. Sometimes it was the little things he had missed the most, not just the grand adventures. “I know - I’m sorry.”

“None of this is your fault,” he promises.

“I’m the one who met Rassilon, I’m the one who came here even though I knew…” Her voice trails off and he wishes she’d finish her sentence, wishes she’d talk to him, give him any sort of insight.

He wonders how to make her feel better, it’s far more difficult to do when he doesn’t feel great himself. Normally it’s chips or a long hug, but this can’t seem to be fixed. “You didn’t know,” he points out. “That you’d meet Rassilon. And I’m glad you came here.”   
Rose is looking at him, blonde hair spread out underneath her. “Travel will help both of us, yeah? Should we get going?”

He agrees grudgingly, taking her hand and leading her to the console room, where Donna and Martha were still waiting, talking about something. “Well if it isn’t the two lovebirds,” Donna jokes, grinning at them.

The Doctor felt sick. He wanted… He wasn’t sure what he wanted. Something. “So, London 1851? That’s when and where the first international chess tournament took place, you know. If it wasn’t for the sake of the timeline, I’d participate.” He grins at them, but there’s no meaning behind it.

He wonders if they can tell. Martha smiles back at him. “Should we get dressed for the occasion?”

Donna and Rose agree, and the three women walk towards the TARDIS’s wardrobe. He follows, hands shoved in his pockets. Rose raises an eyebrow at him. “You gonna watch us get dressed, Doctor?”

He freezes in place and his cheeks flush. “No, I was going to - er - no. That was not… I’m not…” He imagines watching Rose get dressed, watching her pull her shirt over her head to reveal a lacy bra, giving him that tongue-in-teeth smile that drove him mad without failure.

The women just laugh at him, leaving him standing in the hallway, waiting awkwardly. He supposes his pinstriped suit will just have to do. It takes him a moment to realize that Rose had purely been teasing him and that he’d given her the exact reaction that she’d wanted.

A while later, they return from the wardrobe, all dressed in formal gowns. They’re all of a similar style, the ends of the dresses wide and circular, the middle a tight corset. Martha’s is forest green, Donna’s is orange, and Rose’s is…

Rose’s is…

He tries not to gape, tries to turn his eyes away, but there’s no point. It’s a crimson red, her lipstick matching, and she’s wearing black gloves that reveal just a small strip of her forearm. There’s a small, golden necklace with an intricate design around her neck and black high heels that are just hardly visible under the dress. He’s surprised by the amount of cleavage that the dress shows, and he suddenly realizes that he has been staring.

“You’re just gonna wear your suit?” Donna asked, before glancing up and noticing his gaze. “Oh.”

Rose didn’t seem to notice, her hands focused on smoothing down the sides of the dress and adjusting the corset. “This thing is kinda tight,” she notes.

He clears his throat and looks away, knowing that Martha and Donna had caught him ogling. He rubs the back of his neck, trying to seem nonchalant. “I think I’ll fit in just fine. Most men back then wore hats, but I’m not much for hats, personally.”

“Loves his hair too much,” Rose pointed out, grinning.

Her red lipstick contrasted with her white teeth, her eyes glimmering in the light. He feels his hearts stop in his chest and wonders how he’s lived without her so long. A small voice in his head reminds him that he may have to live without her in the future.

Martha is giving him a knowing smile and he winces. He’d been staring again, hadn’t he?

Then he remembers that Rose had spoken. “Don’t pretend you don’t love my hair, Rose Tyler,” he teases.

She ruffles his hair, standing on her tippy toes to reach. “Can’t deny that.”

He feels himself grinning and doesn’t care if Donna sees, despite the jokes he knows that she’ll make later. And it’s a bad idea, letting Rose go out into Victorian London, but he had a list of reasons why it was a bad idea and as he watches her in that red dress it’s hard to remember even one of them…

“You coming, spaceman?” Donna asks.

The Doctor clears his throat and catches up to them. “So in London around 1851, we have the Great Exhibit, which was an industrial exposition of all the nations’ technology. Then we also have the first international chess tournament, won by Adolf Anderssen of Germany.”

“Think you could beat him?” Martha asks.

“No - I know I could.”

Rose turns and rolls her eyes at him, and he’s grinning as they enter the console room, his hands moving to the levers and buttons and directing them towards their intended time and place. “Gonna go show off your chess moves?”

There’s a million retorts he’d give her if they were alone, but with Martha and Donna here, none of them quite feel appropriate. “Of course,” he answers instead.

When they finally land, Rose runs over to the door and swings it open, taking in a breath of fresh air. Martha and Donna follow quickly behind her, gazing at the streets. There are so many colors, so much life that isn’t portrayed in the photographs of the time. Horses and buggies fill the roads, people are milling about the streets, and the women blend right in in their dresses.

The Doctor shoves his hands in his pockets as they walk out, a couple of people giving the police box funny looks before moving on with their lives. “What do you think?” he asks.

“It’s beautiful,” Donna answers, spotting a shop across the street. “Oh, we’ve got to check out that boutique.”   
Martha glances at the Doctor, then Rose, then grabs Donna’s arm. “I’ll go with you!”

Rose is blushing, but he can’t quite tell why. He rubs the back of his neck, glancing at the two women who have already crossed the street, entering the boutique and fawning over every item. “I guess it’s just us, then,” she says, and there’s something to her tone…

“Yep,” he responds, popping the ‘p’. “Where to, Rose Tyler?”

She places her gloved hand in his bare one, and as beautiful as she looks, he wishes that she wasn’t wearing a glove, that it was his fingers brushing against her own. “I dunno, I just wanna explore another time. I’ve missed this so much.”

They begin walking down the street. She ends up deciding to lace her arm with his instead, matching the other couples they walk past.

Eventually, they arrive at a small crowd surrounding a building. “It’s the chess tournament,” he informs her, grinning.

“All of these people are here for the chess tournament?”

“A lot of upper class citizens were interested in chess around this time,” he informs her, pulling his psychic paper out of his pocket. “Ready to see me compete?”

Rose rolls her eyes. “Won’t you mess up history when you win the first international chess tournament?”

He hums. “That’s a good point. Maybe I’ll lose in the semifinals.”

Of course, the moment they enter the building he becomes interested in a particular chess table—“I’ve seen this chess table before, it’s famous, Rose!”—and they’re promptly thrown into a prison.

“I’ll be honest, I’ve missed this part, too,” Rose tells him as they sit beside each other in a small holding cell. “Very typical.”

He stretches out his legs, placing his hands behind his head. “I was just curious,” he complains, though she’s smiling, and he finds himself returning the look. “It’s alright, Donna and Martha will have us out of here in no time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really sorry I haven't updated this fic in ages!! I've been writing again recently and it was bothering me that this one is incomplete, so I'll try to write more for it and get it finished eventually.


End file.
